Here is the largest ground squirrel ever eating a nut.
You are welcome
Funtimes at San Elijo
oh god there are so many squirrels on my camera
A photo appreciation post of the little ground squirrels of San Elijo State Beach that entertained my mother and I on our camping trip where we forgot to bring, well, mostly everything except the tent. We remembered that one. Go us!
As my first trip since returning from Ireland involved going to the beach in California, who wants to guess how ridiculously sunburned I am?
Hint: a lot.
So I am home now and my Ireland adventure has come to an end for the time being (who knows where the future will lead). Thank you to all of you who shared this journey with me and looked at my pretty pictures, you all are quite fantastic. This blog probably won’t be updated much anymore (seeing as I am no longer studying abroad) so please feel free to unfollow and go about your merry ways, no hard feelings, I do so solemnly swear. Eventually, I might start updating about new travels and wanderings, but they most likely will not be quite as exciting as Ireland, because…well, Ireland. It’s an exciting place. But if I find some cool stuff in Southern California, I’ll let y’all know.
Happy travels!
Love, Sam
I am very proud of us all for being able to navigate the city of Dublin like straight up pros. We were most excellent. The bus from Glendalough dropped us off at the top of Dawson St. and we successfully made it to The Times Hostel—go us! Also, if rolly luggage sucked before, it double-sucked in the city. It’s like all of the shame of being the kid with the rolly backpack in middle school multiplied by a million, because now instead of just being a source of malicious amusement, you’re causing traffic jams and irritating city-dwellers every time your stupid luggage flips over in the middle of the street. Stupid rolly luggage. Moving on—we made it to our hostel and checked in! Our room was on the third floor and after we managed to drag all our bags up there, we changed out of our grimy hiking clothes and into grimy (hey we’re college students) city clothes. This hostel was alright. I mean, I don’t think anything can compare to Glendalough, so as far as cities go, I think it’s a pretty decent hostel.
It was pretty late by the time we got back on the street, so we wandered over to the Temple Bar district and ended up in some Italian restaurant. Which ended up being a mistake. The waiter was super rude and kept making sly remarks about us being stupid, fat Americans—“Was it hard for you to get out of that booth?” He phrased them in such a way that it seemed like a normal comment, but then you’d think about it and hear him snicker, and realize the double meaning there. Basically, guy was a jerk. Lamesauce! Afterwards, we headed to a pub and listened to these two guys armed with just a guitar, a violin, and their voices. They were really good. And I have a soft spot for violins (insert Andrew Bird shout out here). We headed back to the hostel for sleepytimes a while later, we were pretty beat.
The next morning—our last full day together in Ireland, oh! The sorrow!—we wandered down into the kitchen for breakfast, which was toast and awful coffee. No worries, toast and awful coffee work well enough! First order of the day was to head to Merrion Square Park and find that ever-elusive (to me, oh I tried to find it so many times!) statue of Oscar Wilde. We did! We found it and it was amazing. My love for that man is a many splendored thing. We then proceeded to play (like the mature adults we are) in the little park, which I am happy to tell you had a rather fantastic swing set. In case you were curious. It was top-notch.
Next up was a visit to the National Art Gallery and the National Museum. Adree, Victoria, and I all agreed that we make a very good trio of buddies due to our shared interests—we moved from playing on swing sets to checking out some works of art with ease. That is a rare friendship, I tell you. So we walked around the art gallery, and it, of course, was beautiful. I always love the Impressionists, and they had a Monet painting that made me cry because I am sappy and emotional and miss my mama (who will forever be connected with Monet in my mind). They had an exhibit on Irish painters (what? In Ireland? Who knew?) that was fascinating because many of the paintings were of Dublin back in the 1800’s or so. It was so strange to recognize the places we had just been walking in these old paintings—what an odd feeling that was! There was a little piece about James Joyce, who I will never be able to take seriously again after reading about his dirty love letters to his ladyfriend. Don’t google that. Just take my word.
Close by was the museum, and it was WONDERFUL. It’s a beautiful building, not to mention the beautiful things inside of it. I’m going to jump right ahead to my favorite part because I can’t stand it. BOG MUMMIES. They had three of them on display. Three! Bog mummies! You don’t even know. Bog mummies are like my thing. If I have a thing. Besides bears and birds and trees and whatnot, it’s bog mummies. Ooh, boy. They’re so amazing—so well preserved! Bogs are legit. The first one, the Cloncayvan Man (I think? Something along those lines) was probably the most intact. His hair, fingernails, and even his little beard were all still there. Poor thing had his neck broken and was tied down under the bog. That’s the thing with bog mummies—they all had rather brutal deaths. Not very pleasant, but I cannot help it; I’m enamored. The second mummy was just a torso—he’d been cut in half and decapitated, as well as otherwise mutilated (it was to do with sacral kingship back in the day in Ireland—anyone who wasn’t ‘whole,’ say if you lost a limb or an eye or so on, was no longer eligible to rule the land. So by mutilating someone like that, you can see how it’d be very degrading). The last one was similar to the first, though not as well preserved. It was a man who had been disemboweled, and was left naked except for a deerskin cloak. Okay, I’m done with the bog mummies (but they are so cool, ah!) and terribly sorry if anyone was grossed out—I can’t help myself. After the mummies, we walked around the Viking Ireland exhibit which was just as cool—skeletons skeletons skeletons, woot woot! They had an almost-complete skeleton of a warrior buried with his sword and dagger from way back in the day, plus a bunch of skulls around the exhibit plus lots and lots of swords and other pointy, metal things.
We eventually had to leave the museum because we were absolutely starving. But not before I took my sweet time in that gift shop. Museums have the best books, folks. And did I ever buy some books. I bought this nifty folk- and fairy tale book that has proven to be most excellent—it’s a collection of poems and stories, both old and new, and you can never have too many fairy tale anthologies. Truth. Ah yes, so I spent too much time in the gift shop and Adree and Victoria dragged me out to get food before we all fainted. We all got burritos at this little place that looked pretty good, but since we are all Southern Californians, we were all severely disappointed. I miss Mexican food so crazy hard. Spicy food! Oh, we shall meet again soon! Since there were no tables there and the cafe next door kicked us out (even though we had ordered drinks there, too, we weren’t just mooching a table!) we ate our sub-par burritos in an alleyway. Class.
Full and happy on what was probably a decent Irish attempt at a burrito, we made our way to the Dublin Writer’s Museum. We were all ridiculously excited to go, Adree and Victoria probably with more credibility than I (they are fantastic writers, I simply love to read). It was a bit of a walk, and once we made it, an elderly man came out and blocked the door and told us that it was closed. Victoria was about to cry when the man laughed and let us know he’d been joking. We went inside and bought our tickets, and talked with the old man a bit—he was hilarious. It looked like the museum was a bit underfunded, and we all lamented that. The tickets were cheap, it was a great idea, so why didn’t more people love it? We did! We reveled in seeing our favorite Irish authors—Oscar Wilde of course, Yeats, Maria Edgeworth, Stoker, Maturin, Beckett, and so on. The museum was in what appeared to be an old three or four story house, and it kind of sprawled randomly, with the best exhibits on the ground floor. We sat for a while on the staircase and had a great discussion about our favorite authors, old and new, the books we loved, what we had to make each other read, upcoming book swaps and whatnot. Books! A core aspect of every friendship. Upstairs was an art gallery of sorts for the authors, and upstairs from that was a lot of nicknacks and what looked like a theatre room for children. A bit weird and we felt like we weren’t supposed to be there, so we headed back downstairs, where there was a gift shop (we wanted to buy all of the books. ALL OF THEM. There was an annotated Dracula contributed to by Neil Gaiman and my heart said I needed it so badly. I think I was physically wounded when I put it down).
When we left the museum, it was getting into the early evening, so we headed to our last goal of the day: tour St. Patrick’s Cathedral. We missed the last tour by mere minutes, and were turned away. We went into the park right next to it, and wiled away a good hour or so on the grass, watching the sun begin to set over the church. When we were hungry enough and cold enough, we went in search of food. No more snooty Temple Bar Italian restaurants for us! We eventually found ourselves in this great little place called Crackbird, and we had the best salads of our entire lives , plus home-made fancy mixed lemonades (all I remember was mine had ginger in it and ginger is to me as catnip is to cats). After dinner, we headed back to the hostel and got our last pints together at O’Doyle’s, the pub conveniently right next door.
In the morning, we got coffee and some breakfast at a Starbucks (yes, I know—what a silly thing to do in Ireland, but sometimes, you just need Starbucks) and headed to a bus station, where, hopefully, a bus would pick us up and take us to the airport. We took a city bus and it took forever—now we know to take the direct route, even if it costs more, it’s worth not having to panic about being late. We made it just fine and got Victoria and Adree checked in, and then came the tragic scene were we had to say good-bye. Lots of hugs and kisses and farewells later, they were both on a US-bound flight and I was on a bus back to Galway.
And so ends this tale.
I will be heading home in a matter of weeks, so it appears that this journey is coming to an end. It’s been quite the adventure.
I wonder where I’ll end up next?
Now, this statue is something special. Could you imagine any better way to pay homage to our dear Oscar Wilde? It’s absolutely perfect. From the sprawling pose and fanciful robe to the smug little smirking smile. We love you Oscar Wilde.
I tried to find this statue every single time I went to Dublin and never managed—so finally! I found it! And it was definitely worth a visit. I can’t help but wish this man had been born a few decades later, when he could’ve been free (well, more free, I suppose. We’re getting there) to express himself to the fullest. Imagine what he could’ve done then! Nevertheless, I tip my hat to you, good sir. You totally rock.
A Peace Garden (how do I get this job—I would love to plant things for peace. Never mind the job aspect…I am on this.Get ready world. Sam is planting things. FOR PEACE.) in the park next to St. Patrick’s Cathedral. We tried to get into the church, but we got there a few minutes too late! No worries though, we ended up lounging about in this lovely little park, so all’s well that ends well.
At the National Museum in Dublin—we gawked at the beautiful zodiac mosaic in the entrance hall. Leos unite!
The Times Hostel in Dublin
Pretty sweet but not as sweet as Glendalough.
Nothing’s as sweet as Glendalough.
They had a very nice shower though, so +100 points
Now, this was my favorite chapter. We took the eight a.m. bus from Galway to Dublin, then caught the bus from Dublin to Glendalough, and arrived around noon or so. We found our hostel fairly easily and dropped all of our gear off. Our hostel was kickass. We were all anxious to see what it would be like because none of us had ever stayed in a hostel before—and after staying there, I cannot recommend this one enough. If you’re ever in the area, check out Glendalough International Youth Hostel. It’s super awesome. It’s right near the monastic site and all the good hikey bits and it’s yellow and cozy and the beds have very entertaining messages carved into them and they serve the most adorable breakfast for four euro. Seriously. You get a fresh jar of milk, a jar of orange juice (and I mean big glass jars, like old-fashioned milk-man jars) a bowl of cereal, as much toast as you want, tea or coffee, and fruit. All served in a sunny, window-filled kitchen with mis-matched wooden tables and chairs. A perfect start to the day.
Oops, got a head of myself there. So we dropped all of our gear off and rested a bit—we were all rather sick from the bus and traveling in general. When we headed down to the site, we each got a veggie burger and some curry chips from a little stand, and ate them while petting a friendly black cat and listening to some man play the bagpipes (in full regalia, too. We didn’t ask questions). Then we checked out the graveyard and the ruins, followed by a tiny bit of hiking around the area. Just walking around a bit and exploring the nearby land—walked up into the hills a bit, then walked down into the boggy area a bit. When it started to get cold and dark, we ate dinner at the hotel, then retired for the evening in our comfy little hostel.
The next morning was when we had our super fantastic breakfast experience—which you already know all about. It was super and fantastic. Then we started out our day with a nice little ramble into the woods. Along the way we found St. Savior’s Church, a beautiful ruin which you have to hike down to. It was amazing—there were all of these carvings in the rock of the church, beautifully intact and quite detailed. My favorite was a griffon. A griffon. I can’t even explain how happy that makes me. Ireland, your ruins are too much for me. I am overwhelmed! We spent quite a lot of time down there. Behind (or in front of?) the church were a few grave stones, but we couldn’t really make out the markings on them. By this time I had rolled around in the dirt (when there are ruins involved, my personal cleanliness and/or dignity cease to matter) sufficiently enough to look truly bedraggled and was sporting some lovely mud stains.
We dragged ourselves away from St. Saviors and continued on with our little jaunt, which at the end follows a path down amongst a few waterfalls. We had lunch in the grass by one of them, then quickly packed up and kept moving when it started to rain a bit heavier (it is always sort of raining in Ireland, but usually it’s nothing to make note of). We wandered around the hills after that, trying to find St. Reefert’s Church. I couldn’t quite remember where it was, and we stumbled upon it by accident. Then, at Victoria’s bidding, we attempted to amble down the hillside like real adventurers instead of using paths. It was super fun and rather stupid of us, but that is nothing new (and to be honest, how I know we all prefer it). I fell a lot, like the graceful creature I am, and Victoria and I both ended up sporting some rather lovely mud stains centred in, of course, the butt region of our jeans. Hilarity ensued. Adree, the fiend, didn’t fall once and looked as immaculate as ever.
We did not have enough time after that for much else, so we frolicked around the lake, got some more chips and some tea, then headed back to our hostel to grab our bags, check out and head to the front of the Visitor’s Centre to wait for the bus. We caught the bus back to Dublin, and so ends the third chapter—our visit to my beloved Glendalough.
Cross at St. Reefert’s Church, Glendalough, Ireland.
Check it out check it out this gravestone is super lovely!
Lil’ baby mountain goats on the hillside in Glendalough.
That spotted one was having a rough time—poor thing kept getting stuck on a branch. You will all be happy to hear he did eventually make it. Huzzah!
