March Recap

I have not written a blog post in a while because I have been very busy! We have had a few fun things happen in Cork recently, and on top of all of that, I have been writing all of my final papers. Here is a quick recap of what has been happening since St. Patrick's Day.

Caitlin, as well as my roommate Kate, had some friends of visit cork, and we did lots of fun things with them around the city.

The view from the top of St. Anne's Church

Caitlin, Lindsay, Kathleen, Me 

As you can see it was a beautiful day! We then continued around the city center where we found the brand new Starbucks! This is a very big deal because not only are there no other Starbucks, but most of the coffee here is pretty bad so its nice to see a familiar, reliable, coffee shop. 

Later that night I went out for drinks with my roommates and Kate's friend Ally, who was visiting for the week. 

Kate, Suzanne, Ines, Me, and Ally at The Edison

 March 23rd was Caitlin's 21st birthday! We are still in the midst of classes so we went to class for the day, and celebrated later that night.  We got her a birthday cake from the English Market and decorated her bedroom, and common room with lots of balloons, a 21st birthday sign, and completed her outfit with a princess tiara! After cake and presents we went out for a quick drink, but being a Monday night we called it quits early on. 

Caitlin blowing out her candles

On Tuesday night we had more time to celebrate so the Cork group, Chelsea, Nicole, Julia, Caitlin and Me were joined by Lindsay for dinner at Cafe Mexicana. It is this adorable hole in the wall Mexican restaurant that I went to once before and knew had excellent food so I was very excited to go back.

My dinner of enchiladas

 Later in the week my St. Patrick's Day package finally arrived from my mom! She had told me that something would be coming so each day I was patiently checking reception to see if something had come for me.  Finally, after two weeks, it got here, and was well worth the wait! As always, it included socks, and also a scarf; very nice surprise.

St. Patrick's Day Care Package

Thursday night of last week was especially fun.  Caitlin and I worked out in between our classes and arrived home for the night at 7pm.  Famished, and in the mood for good food, we decided to go to La Tana for dinner. This was perfect because I had stashed away for a day exactly like that one, a gift from my older sister, Katie.  She had snuck into my bag the day I left a card with this envelope inside, along with some euros.  I have been holding on to it all year, excited about when I get to use it, and I was so happy I finally did.  

My gift from Katie

Caitlin and I decided to split two different kinds because there were too many good options and we could not decide.  We landed on a Campagna, and a Parma; two of the best pizzas I have ever had!

Parma: parma ham with sundried tomatoes and basil pesto

Campagna: caramelized plums (although I could have sworn they were peaches), parmesean cheese, parma ham, and rocket (which is their way of saying arugula) 

THANK YOU KATIE!!! 

Today, I attended Palm Sunday mass at the church located right behind my apartment complex.  The priest was a fast talker so it ended up being the shortest Palm Sunday mass that I have ever been to, just over an hour! 

Palm and Program from the Church of the Immaculate Conception 

In between all of this fun has been a lot of hard work finishing up my papers, but I am getting very excited about my trip coming up, almost there!

St. Patrick's Day

Tuesday was St. Patrick's Day! It is one of my favorite days of the year because everyone is in a good mood, and since there are not that many expectations surrounding this holiday, it always turns out to be a lot of fun.

It was especially fun in Ireland this year for a couple of reasons.  The first was that because it is a national holiday over here there were no classes held! Secondly, the weather here was absolutely gorgeous, mid 50s, warm and very sunny.  It was enjoyable to be outside, walking around, and good weather always puts everyone in a good mood.  

The morning started with a festive brunch in my apartment.  My roommates and I organized a brunch to invite people over to enjoy green colored food, and begin the day together.  I made green pancakes, Suzanne worked on the bacon, Ines helped with the green eggs and Mara and Kate pitched in with the clean up and set up.  

Green egg and pancake mixtures

Finished Product: looks gross but was very fun and festive! 

Because it was such a nice day we left the windows in our common room open and people from our apartment complex would stop in and say hi and join us all morning.  

We then left around 12:30pm to go into the city for the parade.  There was a ton of activity, and I think it was the most crowded I have ever seen the city, even including Christmas time.  There were food vendors lined all throughout the sidewalks and a big parade happening in the street.

My outfit for the day: 

Irish sweater to keep me warm and green headband and feather boa to be festive

Complete with a "Kiss Me I'm Irish" Face tattoo 

Apartment 19 Crew 

Back: Mara, Kate, Ines

Front: Suzanne, Me 

Julia and Me: Julia made these fun straws that had paper cutouts of mustaches on them so it looked like you had a mustache when you were drinking - mine fell slightly for this photo but they were a lot of fun! 

Cork City Centre Parade - I was two people deep behind the gates so it was hard to get good photos but I could still see some and hear all the great music! 

Julia and Me at the parade

Chelsea and Me at the Parade 

Our normal group was split up because some of the girls chose to go to Dublin for their parade, like Caitlin and Nicole, but the group that was in Cork had a blast! We were playing music all day, enjoying the nice weather and celebrating the holiday.  I have loved getting to know my roommates this year, and I am definitely going to miss them when I leave. We are trying to do fun things like yesterday as often as possible before we all go home to different parts of the world. 

*note* found out from lots of Irish people that it is NOT St. Patty's like we like to say in America, but the proper terminology is St. Paddy's! 

Ring of Kerry: Day 3

Even though Sunday was the day that we traveled home, we still had a day packed with activities. When we left after breakfast in the morning we had to be all packed to go home, but we wouldn't arrive back in Cork until 5pm.

Our first stop was along the coast. We started high up on the mountain and worked our way down throughout the day.

The second stop was to Daniel O'Connell's house.  He was an Irish political leader that is known for leading the campaign for Catholic emancipation.  The main street in Dublin is named after him.

The front of the house

The view from the back of the house

His house was right on the water so after taking a tour of the inside we got to spend some time on the beach.  This is one of my favorite spots in all of Ireland.  We lucked out with one of the sunniest days from my entire time abroad, which made for a warm and enjoyable experience.

Caitlin, Chelse and Me (hard to make us out it was so sunny!) 

The entire HC Crew: Nicole, Me, Caitlin, Chelsea, Francie, Caitlin and Julia

From there we got back on the bus and drove to Killarney national park.  We stopped at a flat opening and sat outside and had a picnic lunch.

 View from our lunch spot

After lunch we drove a little farther and stopped along a path we got to see the famous Torc waterfall.

Chelsea, Caitlin, Julia and Me in Killarney National Park

From there we walked across the street and saw the estate of the owners of the property before it was turned into a national park.  This is when Queen Elizabeth stayed when she came to visit, that is how incredible this spot is.

The House

View from the house

View of the house from the water

Me standing on a rock overlooking the mountains

Overall, I had an excellent weekend at the Ring of Kerry.  I had not done a lot of traveling around Ireland since the first few months that I got here and it reminded me how beautiful the country that I am living in is.  While the rest of Europe is also great, I don't think anything compares to Ireland.

Ring of Kerry: Day 2

The second day started with an early wake-up call for breakfast, and shortly after the bus left for the day.  While I would have enjoyed a little more sleep, I am glad that we got going so quickly because we had a jam packed day. 

Our first stop was along the way to our second stop where we got out on the side of the road to take in the giant cliff we were driving along. 

Our second stop was to the bottom of a hill where the tour guide dropped us off and said "You have one hour, try and get to the top its a beautiful view, but not everyone can make it so there are stopping points along the way".  We looked at this small hill in front of us and almost laughed at her and quickly started climbing. 

At the top of the hill we realized this was actually a mountain, and there were about five more massive climbs to the top.  We were panting, and sweating so hard we were peeling off all of our layers.  But as I've learned this year with so many other sites, the higher the climb the better the view.  This theory could not have been more true with this site; it was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.  

Caitlin and Me at one of the stopping points:

We stopped on the way down to see what we missed, on the way up we were so focused on just making it to the top we didn't look anywhere but up

The view from the top of Geoghan Mountain

Me, Caitlin, Julia, Nicole and Chelsea

One of my favorite pictures from this year, it doesn't look real 

The Holy Cross girls trying to contort our bodies into an HC! 

When we finally made it back down to the bottom of the hill again we walked across the street to visit a local farmer. He and his wife showed us their baby calves, some weeks old and some a month old and explained what they use, and what they sell. 

We then got back on the bus and headed off to our next destination of the day. We went to Valentia island, which is an island that inhabits only about 600 people, and until recently the only way to get there was on a boat because there was no bridge connecting it to the mainland.  

Valentia Island is home to the first international cable, allowing Ireland to make calls overseas.  Our first stop on the island was to meet the crew of volunteer rescuers. These men all have jobs of their own, but volunteer to be the ones to respond to calls of distress anywhere on these waters.  They let us explore the boat and answered our questions about their training, rescues, and more. 

Julia and I on the boardwalk

Rescue boat and crew

Me "driving the boat" 

 Boats docked on the island 

After this we went back to the hotel for lunch, and then had some free time.  The girls and I decided to walk into the town of Cahersiveen, where we were staying, and look around a bit. It is a very small town, there is one main road, but it is very traditional Irish.  There is really only about one grocery store, one repair shop and two pubs that make up this town. 

The pub: Mike Murts

  

The Church

Classic colorful street 

That night we had dinner back at the hotel and then there were more entertainers.  The first was a local singer who taught us famous Irish drinking songs, and we had a sing-a-long.  After that, we had a game of trivia, but unfortunately my team did not win anything.