The rocky road to... Belfast?

So the past days have been wonderful.

Glendalough is an absolutely gorgeous area, with two lakes and an indescribable amount of beautiful scenery, including a number of ruins, a 110 foot high monastic tower (still intact) and a miner's village. The ruins and lakes are in a large valley. One side of the valley looks like a massive landslide, with enormous rocks everywhere. Splinter and I used them as a path instead of... well, the path. There was also a small river (stream, really), that was covered in more rocks. Blanche and I hiked around there and up the river, I went nearly all the way up, climbing on and around waterfalls and stunning natural ponds. I may go back for a night before I leave.

We hiked around the breathtaking ridge of the valley, staring down into a landscape that puts to shame any painting, poem, or movie made about Ireland. My pictures dont do it even remote justice.

That evening we left Glendalough for Dublin, and checked into a great hostel called Avalon House (fantastic name, isnt it?). They have free wi-fi, free high speed internet terminals, free breakfast consisting of muesli, toast, coffee, tea, and orange juice, two pool tables, a foosball table, a ping pong table, and free luggage storage. And two TV's, and a host of free movies, though we didnt partake in those. We eventually went out to a pub... one of the most famous in Dublin, the Temple Bar. There was a group playing traditional Irish music, which we, of course, snag along to (we're pirates. We know the songs). The night was fabulous.

The next morning (Monday) we woke up and went to Trim Castle. Which is, beyond a doubt, the largest castle I've seen. (The Trim castle is actually the castle double used in Braveheart for the castle of York. I was wrong in my earlier post). We all got student discounts for the tour around the keep and access to the grounds. We climbed a few things on the grounds we shouldn't have, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. We then went off and wandered over to the Yellow Steeple, which is a large ruined monastic... steeple. The entire steeple is 120 feet high, I think, but the back had a wall (20 feet high?) that was begging to be climbed. So we did. We climbed up the side of the steeple and into a ruined window, from which we... well, sat. It was thoroughly enjoyable, even with my paralyzing fear of heights.

Lunch was curry chips and a fish sandwich. Delicious.

That evening... we saw The Dark Knight. And I have no words. Well, I have a few. Namely: fantastic, incredible, stunning, dark, thrilling, powerful, and beautiful. And Heath Ledger was a god. Beyond a shadow of a doubt the star of the show, playing the character so twisted that it gave him insomnia and contributed to his devastating death.

Splinter left the next day. Karla, Blanche and I wandered, I bought Neverwhere and The Fountainhead, and we read in St Stephen's Green, a wonderful park in the south of Dublin. Dinner was a fabulous sandwich of ham, tomato and cheese, with large mushrooms cooked in soy sauce with cheese on top on the side. Delicious.

Then Karla left the next morning (Wednesday, yesterday) Blanche and I wandered around quite a bit, I went into H&M, found an amazing shirt that just barely didnt fit me, and bought stuff for dinner. We read in the park again, and watched children get mobbed by birds when they threw pieces of bread for them. Last night we went back to the Temple Bar, got two large bottles of Bulmers for 6,60 euro each, and drank and sang while the band played more trad music. Did I mention that we bought a two-litre of cider (real cider, not the bullshit non-alc stuff in America) at tesco for 4,50? It was pretty good, all things considered.

Today we wandered more, Blanche got an umbrella and towel. We sat in a gazebo on the green (its raining) and read some, and sat in the hostel and read more. I'm going to get on a train in an hour and a half to head to wonderful Belfast, withdraw Ulster pounds (damn UK, stupid different currency with wretched dollar-to-pound exchange rate), and sleep in a hostel, then pick Phil up the next morning! What could be better? Well, tomorrow morning being right now, for one. And a couple hundred thousand pounds. That'd be good too. And a house in Switzerland and an EU citizenship. But that'll all come in a few years :-P