London

Okay - London, as promised. It was a great trip, although very tiring! (more on that later.) I think I tackled most of the big "touristy" things and it was definitely the most beautiful city I've ever seen in my life. America just doesn't compare with some of these European places...

We arrived on Thursday evening and spent the night hanging out with the people who were kind enough to house us. Luckily, Allison and Kathleen had friends in London and so we got to stay with them free of charge! Good thing too, because London is expensive enough without having to pay for a hostel. Anyways, we were out and about all day Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. We had a morning flight back home on Monday.
The World Series was on while we were in London, and so we found ourselves staying up into the wee hours of the morning watching it on the internet. As you can probably guess, we were exhausted from it. As a result of the lack of sleep, the days sort of run together in my memory, so these pictures might be out of chronological order (although they're mostly proper...) On to the meat and potatos - caption under picture:


That's me in the center of Picadilly Circus. Now, I had heard the name 'Picadilly Circus' dozens of times, and heard stories of people proposing there, etc. so I kind of glorified this place in my mind. It's actually just a fountain in the center of like a 7-street intersection. Really not much to see... but the area surrounding Picadilly is really cool. Lots of neat shops, gigantic T.V. screens hanging from buildings. It kind of reminded me of Times Square. Anyways, here's me infront of the fountain in Picadilly Circus



Buckingham Palace, and me in front of it. Not much to say here. I unfortunately didn't get a picture of the changing of the guards because I didn't get to see it. The Saudi Arabian (president?) was coming for a visit so the security was very high and the guard-changing ceremony was on hiatus. We got asked to vacate the premises shortly after snapping these photos.


These guys were waltzing down The Mall - which they closed off (that's the major road leading up to the Buckingham Palace) before the Saudi Arabian (president?) came. Apparently the English like to have security with class.


A park right next door to the palace. I believe it was called St. James Park. We weren't kicked out of the park, but there were police officers all over the place since the Saudi Arabian (president?) was coming by.


No significance to this - just a random arch down the street from Buckingham Palace. It has a name, but I didn't catch it. These things were all over the place... the English are big fans of the arch I guess.



Two shots of parliament. This building was HUGE - these two pictures don't even come close to representing how huge this place was. And it was ridiculously ornate, too - as you can probably tell. That's Big Ben you see in the left of the second picture.


There's the most famous clock in the world - Big Ben. I had no idea this thing was attached to the Parliament building, I was always under the impression that it was free standing. Pretty cool at any rate. Unfortunately, you weren't allowed to go in Big Ben or the Parliament building - only view from afar.



There's the Parliament building again from two other areas. The first one is from a random bridge, and the second shot is from Westminster Abbey (which I'll get to.)
We did these two things on day one - also not pictured is the National Gallery. It was a crazy art museum with all kinds of famous paintings in it - the building itself was practically a work of art. Unfortunately photography wasn't allowed, so I don't have any pictures to share, but it was really cool. Read about it here if you're interested.



These are the front and side entrances of Westminster Abbey, respectively. Unfortunately, they didn't allow photography inside so these next pictures are a little lackluster since I had to sneak them. There were only a few places where priests and employees weren't walking around, so I didn't capture a fraction of what I would have liked to. The abbey was ridiculous, everywhere you turned it was jam packed with tombs, memorials, paintings, etc.







Incase you didn't catch the sign - that last picture is the oldest door in England. Amazing, I know. I had to take a picture of it. Built in approximately 1050 AD. Sexy.
The outdoor looking area is from a cloister within the abbey. I have a couple more pictures, but I had to take them so fast to avoid being caught that they didn't come out very well. It really was unbelievable in there though, I think I hung out in the place for somewhere in the region of 2.5 hours.


This is the London Dungeon. It's kind of like a year-round haunted house and more. It was pretty cool. I didnt get any pictures the inside because it was completely dark, so nothing would have come out very well. Basically, you just go room to room and they put on shows in each one about various gruesome ways people died from the renaissance through present day. The Bubonic Plague, the Great Fire of London, Jack the Ripper, various other killers, ways in which people were tortured, etc. Every room has its own little "show" and there are people that pop out at you or try to scare you otherwise in between as you make your way through the rooms. There's also rooms in which the floor, ceiling, and walls are all mirrors (talk about disorienting)and other "fun-house" type things like that. It was pretty cool.



This is Tower Bridge. It's the fanciest bridge in London. I guess a lot of tourists (understandably) mistake this for the London Bridge. Truth be told: the London Bridge is actually the plainest, lamest bridge in the city. And that's not even an exaggeration. The only notable thing about the London bridge is how unnotable it is. The Tower Bridge is the nice one though, and there's a lot of cool things around it. Sculptures, fountains, fancy buildings, shopping, etc. I have pictures of a bunch of them, but nothing is really worth posting (unless you want to see random buildings, etc. In which case - let me know.)


I thought this was interesting, so I hunkered down and took a photo of it. This is actually just a little tiny drainage canal coming from.. .. well, somewhere. I couldn't track down the source because it disappears under ground eventually. But it runs for at least several hundred meters down the middle of the sidewalk like this before disappearing under ground again on the other side. Oh, and you'll notice one of the towers of Tower Bridge off in the distance.


A ways down the river from the Tower Bridge is the Science Museum (that glorious building you'll see in the first picture). That ferris wheel contraption you see is called the London Eye. It's basically a big ferris wheel that slowly revolves (it takes about half an hour for one complete revolution) and gives an amazing view of the city. I had really wanted to do it, but unfortunately the weather just wasn't worth it. It was cloudy, drizzly, and foggy the entire time we were in London and I'm told the view kind of sucks in those conditions. Considering it cost the equivalent of $30 USD, I abstained. That second photo is of a street performer. These guys were all over the place along the river between the science museum and tower bridge. I took a picture of this guy because he dressed up like a Winston Churchill statue, and actually stayed so still that birds were landing on him.

We went to this really high-scale department store called Harrods on Sunday. This place was nuts. Everything from clothes, to food, to toys and electronics. And it was all incredibly expensive and high end. They had an entire room of gourmet chocolatiers. I would have gotten some to bring home, but I asked one of the employees and they said that the chocolate would get 'stale' by Christmas time. Sorry guys. I didn't get to take many pictures because the place was packed, so most of the pictures would have just been people. Curiously enough, the only two pictures I got were in the Fish Market. I guess it's because not many people buy fish in a department store that I managed to snap these shots...



That first one is a FISH FOUNTAIN! That's right. Those are real fish, and they must have inserted tubes in them or something, because some of these fish were squirting water. You can't really tell in the photos, but the top two fish were misting. It was pretty funny. The second picture is just a crazy shark kind of thing. I know, it's weird that the only thing in this place I took pictures of was fish. I thought the same thing when I reviewed my photos. As long as we're on the subject though: In Europe, the seafood section of a grocery store is called the "Fishmonger".




And what photo-documentary would be complete without some of my car pictures!? (Don't worry, I'm sparing you the Aston Martin, the Lamborghini, and the Audi R8 I took pictures of). You really can't tell what's going on in that first picture, so I'll explain it. A bus is sideways in the road, trying to do a K-Turn, and blocking traffic. I have no idea how he ended up in this predicament, but it was pretty funny to watch. It took the guy about 5 or 10 minutes to "Austin Powers" it out of the middle of the road. He would back up about a foot, crank the wheel, go forward about a foot, crank the wheel, back up about a foot.... over and over again until he finally made shimmied himself back on track with the road. The jerk in the taxi who pulled up next to him didn't make life any easier. Speaking of which, that's what every taxi in London looks like. They all look like old gangster cars, if you ask me. That second picture is an electric car recharging at a public recharge-o-meter. I've never seen this before, so I had to take a picture. I spotted a few of these "recharge-o-meters" (I don't know what they're actually called) around the city. Pretty neat.


And I'll leave you with this to give you an idea of the kind of architecture that's prevalent here. This isn't anything fancy, none of these are landmark buildings. This is just looking down an average street... pretty nice, huh? I thought so...

Anyways, that's it for my London pictures. Unfortunately, I didn't snap any pictures of Covent Garden or Leicester Square. Covent Garden was just a big enclave of shops, street performers, food, etc. Leicester Square was in the theater district, and there were a lot of plays and shows going on there. Kathleen ended up going to one (she's into theater) but the rest of us held off because they were so expensive. There was a lot of other stuff to do around Leicester Square too though: shops, food, London's chinatown, etc. All in all, it was a really good weekend - and since I got free lodging, it really wasn't even all that expensive!

Tomorrow, after work, I'm leaving for Galway. Tentatively, we're going to be doing the Aran Islands and then a tour of the Burren and the Cliffs of Moher (which I've already seen, but nobody else has, so it should be fun). So stay tuned for the next installment.

Kilmainham Gaol and Modern Art Museum

It's late, so London is going to have to wait for tomorrow. That's a promise, because I'm leaving for Galway on Thursday and I'd like to get London up tomorrow so that I can post the pictures while the trip is still fresh in my mind. And I know I make a lot of crap promises on here, but really. Tomorrow.

Anywho, last Friday (October 19) we went to Kilmainham Gaol and the Modern Art Museum. Kilmainham Gaol is where the Easter Rising organizers were taken, held, and eventually executed. It was also a major jail in the Dublin area for a long time, but the Easter Rising shenanigans are what it's best known for. If you dont know about Easter Rising, I suggest googling it or hopping on wikipedia. The cliffnotes version is that it was a rebellion in 1916 which marked the turning point in the Irish struggle for independence. But anyways, we went to Kilmainham Gaol, and then since the Modern Art Museum was nearby, we visited that too. It was free. Which is a good thing, because I hate modern art, and the modern art that was in there was stupid. Somehow painting a 6 foot x 6 foot piece of canvas flat black constitutes art. Maybe I'm just missing "the point", but that constitutes a spill as far as I'm concerned. I hope those artists are still starving. At any rate, they didn't let you take pictures in the museum. Which is just as well, because I wouldn't have taken a picture of anything anyways - except maybe to show everyone how lame it was. Onto the pictures. Captions below the pictures, as has become my standard practice.


There you see a hallway in Kilmainham Gaol. Most of the cell hallways looked like this. Nothing too fancy.. which I guess is what you wouldexpect with an early 20th century jail.



Okay, two shots of the same room - one from each end of it. This was the "main hall" of the jail and the Easter Rising organizers were held in various cells within this room. Looks pretty cool if you ask me. If it looks familiar, it's because it's been in a few movies. Michael Collins and the Boondock Saints are the only ones I know of, but I remember them saying on the tour that there were others as well...


This is one of the cells from the room above. You'll notice the door to the right of the photo, that's because I was standing in the doorway when I took this (to give you an idea of the size of the cells). Not very large at all. I guess when the jail was designed, these were meant to be single-occupant cells. The philosophy behind it was that a prisoner could be better rehabilitated when they were kept alone and had a chance to repent in solitude. They said that the windows were designed to be so high up so that the prisoners were constantly "looking up towards God." This was all new in the world of jailing, I guess they say this was one of the first jails built with the goal of rehabilitating prisoners as opposed to just confining and keeping them segregated from society. At any rate, the 1-person-per-cell ideology didn't go on for long, because there were a lot of poor people in early 1900s Ireland (not to mention for a long time before that) and so many were forced to steal just to keep from starving to death. As a result, there were usually 3-4 people per cell. But I suppose that's enough of a history lesson for this one photo. Learn something new everyday, right?





These pictures are all from a courtyard within the confines of the jail. That first picture is where all of the Easter Rising organizers, sans one, were executed by a firing squad. The second picture marks the spot where one Easter Rising organizer was executed in a separate spot from the rest. The story goes that he was shot in the thigh and horribly wounded - probably fatally if they didn't execute him anyways - during the rising. He couldn't stand to be shot by the firing range like the rest of the organizers, so they dragged him out on a chair and he was shot at the other end of the courtyard. The plaque is on the wall between the two crosses and commemorates those who were executed.

And thus concludes my pictures from Kilmainham Gaol. As usual, I have others of some less interesting stuff - just let me know if anyone wants to see them.

On to the Museum of Modern Art. Now like I said, I wasn't a fan, but the building itself and the grounds were picture-worthy, so I won't deprive you of the scenery:


That's the walk up towards the main entrance of the Museum. Pretty spiffy, if I do say so.


Glance to your left during the walk up the path towards the entrance and you see this. The obelisk is from Phoenix Park.



These are the gardens on one side of the Museum. The first picture is from the edge of the museum looking out into the gardens. The second picture is from the end of the gardens looking back towards the museum. I thought it was pretty nice...

So that concludes my museum of modern art pictures. Nothing too great for this one, but London will be up tomorrow night!

Off to England

Okay, so if there's one thing you should've learned about me by now - it's that I'm terrible at updating this blog. Sorry. I'm heading off to London later today for a 4 day trip, and will be back on Monday with pictures to share (although when they'll actually make it up here is still to be determined. I'm through assuring you that I'll update this blog tomorrow, or the next day, etc. because it seems I'm not very good at following through.)

Just to keep you all updated on the past week and change:

This past Friday (Oct 19) we went to Kilmainham Gaol (which I have pictures of and will post when I post the London pictures) and the Irish Museum of Modern Art (which was free, thank science, because I hate modern art. I just got dragged along). Kilmainham, if you weren't aware, was the prison in which the Easter Rising establishers were held and then later executed - it was really cool.

Saturday (Oct 20) was the final game of the rugby world cup. It was England vs. South Africa, and as I'm sure you can imagine - most of Ireland was cheering for South Africa. And not in vain either, because they won! We went to a sports bar called the Woolshed to watch the game. It was a huge place and they projected the game up onto the wall, not to mention there were TVs every 15 feet showing it. We all had a great time and enjoyed some crazy antics.

Alice Cronin, who works for Stonehill's study abroad program and is responsible for actually getting me over here to Ireland, came to visit us this past weekend. She took us all out for dinner on Monday night at an Italian place in Temple Bar. Then on Tuesday, Rebecca Woolf and Tom Kelley (the two EUSA people who got me my job, teach the class I'm taking, and make sure I dont die in Ireland) took myself, Alice Cronin, and Chris McCann (my boss) out to lunch. The purpose behind it was for EUSA to show Mrs. Cronin that they're doing a good job getting the kids involving job placements. I guess I have a good internship seeing as they go for my job and my boss to try and show off what they're up to. We went to probably the fanciest restaurant I've ever been to, at any rate. I felt a tad out of place as my fancy restaurant etiquette is a bit undeveloped, but the food was delicious and it got me out of 2 hours of work - which is always nice.

On Tuesday, after work, I went to see a play at the Abbey Theater called "Playboy of the Western World". It's an older play, and somewhat famous in Irish theater I guess, but this one was a remake in modern times. It was a great play, and very funny. I probably laughed more than I do at most comedic movies. And while being funny, it still made some strong points. Again, great play. I enjoyed it quite a bit (and I'm not even into theater!)

Later today I'm off to London. I don't know what we're going to be up to, but ofcourse - I shall update upon my return with stories.

Kerry

Okay. Sorry for the delay in postings, it's been hectic with traveling, work, class, and me being lazy and enjoying my leisure too much. I went to Amsterdam last weekend and Killarney this weekend. Make sure to see the post below this one for Amsterdam.

This past weekend myself, Erin, and Allison we went to Killarney, in County Kerry. This is where my paternal grandfather's family came from (i.e. the O'Connor side). Unfortunately, the two full-days we spent there were pretty cloudy, so the pictures aren't especially vivid. Rest assured, the pictures don't do the landscape justice. It was beautiful. We hopped a train there on Thursday night after work, went to our hostel, and then rented bikes and biked through a bit of Killarney National Park on Friday. We saw some of the Killarney lakes, Muckross Abbey, the Muckross Mansion, and Torc falls. We went through Muckross Mansion, but in the name of preservation, they keep the blinds closed and don't allow photography. Too bad, it was a really cool in there.

Saturday we took the famed "Ring of Kerry" tour, which is a bus tour that cruises around the Kerry countryside. We finished Friday off by watching the World Cup of Rugby in a pub (I understand the general concept but am still clueless on the majority of the rules and nuances of the game - however, it was still exciting to watch. It was France vs. England, and France was heavily favored to win - but England came from behind in the final minutes of the game to clinch it and will be going on to the final.) After that we headed to another pub with traditional Irish music, a band called the Molly McGuires. It was four guys and one of them was hammered and kept talking inbetween songs for like 5 minutes at a time, but he was pretty funny. The locals (what the Dubliners would call "culchies" - basically the Irish version of rednecks) were hilarious and made a huge ruckus. They were all hammered and were dancing around and pulling people up from the tables - most of whom were tourists - and making them dance too. Traditional Irish dancing too, step dancing and the kind of stuff you'd expect to see at an 'ol country hoedown or something. I wish I got some videos or pictures of this, but unfortunately I didn't have my camera with me at that point. Anywho, on to the pics. I'll try to do these in chronological order. Caption under the picture:


Here's a river we passed over on our ride towards Killarney National Park.


Some sheep at one of many, many farms. Also on the way to the national park, but still very much inside the town of Killarney.





Okay, here's a bunch back to back. At this point we're starting to get towards the outskirts of Killarney. This was just a lake we saw and happened to stop by. The ruins were some old castle that belonged to the McCarthy family. It was one of three castle's they ruled the area from. It's from the 1200's, so pretty old... If anybody wants to see more pictures, I have them by the way. This is just a synopsis sorta thing, I took close to 200 pictures so if anyone wants more of any of this stuff (probably not) just let me know and I'll upload em.




This is the Muckross Abbey. As you can see from the first photo, it's undergoing some renovations - but it was deserted when we were there, which was pretty nice (I know you can see people in the first picture, but that was taken on the way back actually, so those people weren't around when we were there). We got to walk through the entire building. There was a big yew tree growing in a courtyard in the center, which was cool. I also have plenty more pictures of this place if anyone wants to see em, but they're pretty boring unless you're into the architecture of an abbey.




Sorry if this is a bit morbid, but at the Abbey I noticed a few O'Connor graves. Chances are there's no relation to my family, but I figured I would snap the photos just incase (I mean, hey, we did come from the region after all). I'll have to consult the higher ups in my family and see if any of these names ring a bell.


Here's Muckross House. It's a famous mansion that has a long history in the area and was preserved to depict victorian-era life for both the servitude and the upper class. The house has a mildly interesting history, which you can read about if you just google up Muckross House (and you can also see some more pictures that do it more justice). It was really cool inside, just about everything in the house is original.


Here's the view from the side of the Muckross house (the master bedroom windows looked out on this.) That lake is actually connected with the one I posted earlier (although it's a different lake. I think that one is called lower lake and the other one was middle or upper lake. I'm no geologist, but let's just go with that.)





Here are the famed Muckross Gardens. There was a lot more to see than this, but unfortunately I didn't go as crazy as maybe I should've with the picture taking in the gardens. The good news: Allison and Erin did, so I can scoop up some of their photos as soon as I get the chance...






After Muckross House we biked over to Torc Falls. The first couple of pictures were just shots of the stream coming down from the falls as we were on our way up. The falls were really beautiful - just out in the middle of the woods and very untouched by man. By the way, getting out to that rock was not easy. So enjoy the crap out of that picture, because it was a pain in the ass to make it happen.




After a hike up some paths that wound around the falls, I found myself at a point with a hell of a view. Unfortunately you couldn't see the falls because of all the foliage; but basically, looking at those original pictures of the waterfall, I was at a higher elevation than the highest point of the waterfall and slightly back / to the left of it. If that makes sense? If not, don't sweat it, just enjoy the pictures. Everyone points out that I'm an incredibly fake smiler in photos and that it looks like I'm having a miserable time but trying to feign enjoyment.. .. if you agree with them, rest assured that this was not the case.

And thus concludes our biking tour. We biked back and then got dinner and hit the pubs. Saturday morning we went on the Ring of Kerry tour, which was also amazing. I have a ridiculous amount of photos of this, but so many of them are just of landscapes and I figured I would bore everyone to death if I had 70 pictures of the Irish landscape. If anyone wants more pictures, just let me know. But without further adieu:




Here's a Bog Village Museum we stopped at. This was like a 5 or 6 family village where people harvested peat from the bogs. There were a handful of houses which you could go into and were restored to be historically accurate. That forge and the bellows is original. I have pictures of the other houses in the village and some stuff, but really, they're just the same as this one with maybe some regular house decor instead of a forge inside.



Awww, doggies. I figured Chris would like that picture. And then there's the horse. I took the picture because I thought it was the fattest horse I've ever seen, and thought that was funny. It didn't even cross my mind that the horse was probably pregnant until someone pointed it out to me earlier tonight. Joke's on me I guess, but I'm still including the picture.




Okay, this is a river where one of those Killarney lakes drains out towards the ocean. Yup...



This is where that river above eventually empties out. I mean, not right there, but into that body of water. That's some sort of bay or harbor or something - I dont remember the name of it. But that landmass off in the distance is Dingle Peninsula.



This was just a parking lot at the top of a smaller mountain where people could take pictures and admire the view. I'm not sure if the picture really depicts it, but there were rays of sunshine which were breaking through the clouds out in the ocean and illuminating portions of the water, which was really cool looking. It was unbelievably windy up here, as the next picture will show...


Like I was saying, pretty windy. This was taken from the opposite side of the parking lot as the above pictures. Unfortunately it doesn't include much of the valley below, which was beautiful and had a "ring fort" in it that was incredibly old - I think they were saying something like 2000 years old... and still in good shape!



Here's an old church in a little village we stopped in. The second picture is taken from the church, looking out to what would be your right in the first picture. Those little cones were actually used by monks to keep bees and gather their honey.





Here's a place called "Lady's View". It was named this because, as the story goes, when Queen Victoria visited in the 1860's (she actually stayed at Muckross House) a few of her servants were brought to this point and proclaimed that it was the most beautiful view they had ever seen. The pictures really don't do it justice - too bad it was a cloudy day.

Anywho, that concludes the photos I got. Allison and Erin both have a bunch more photos, and of some things that I didnt get to snap shots of, so I'll see if I can grab those from them and maybe update in a few days with more pictures.