We left early Friday morning on our very first overnight excursion. Our destination was the mountainous Connemara region. It's only about an hour and a half away from our "home." Our first stop was a place called Mamead (I believe that I spelled it right. The bus parked there and we were sent on a hiking journey that overall lasted about 2 hours. We followed a "path" up into the mountains. The "path" was really just a bunch of rocks placed into the ground to help you get footing on the way up. It was nothing like a smooth paved sidewalk. So we reached the end of the path where a little chapel in the mountain was. It was only about a third of the way up the mountain I would guess. It was pretty cool to see, but we didn't really know much about the actual chapel itself. So being such an adventurous group that we are, we decided to deviate from the path. We continued to climb the mountain while the other tourists by the chapel decided to head back down. I got about 3/4 the way up the mountain and decided that was enough. The view was breath-taking and everyone in the group found their own little rock or sitting area where you could just enjoy the surroundings. It was definitely the best part of my day. So then we had try and find a way down the mountain. We couldn't remember the exact path that we took but we could see the rocky path that would lead us back to our bus. We ventured on through the mountains on the bus. We took a short cut which definitely was interesting. We ran into a herd of sheep, a group of cows, and a very small rickety bridge (but we made it over!). On the way to our next destination we saw what Alan (our bus driver) called a Leprechaun Hotel. We stopped in Leenane for lunch and a tour of their sheep and wool museum. After we refueled we headed on to Clifden where we would stay the night. After showering and eating we went to a poetry reading by the famous Irish poet Seamus Heaney. We are actually reading some of his poems here in Ireland for our Seminar class. It was a really cool experience. I had never been to a poetry reading before so I wasn't really sure what to expect. He seemed really down to earth and eager to meet people. After this we had the evening free and we roamed around the town of Clifden. The girls that I went with decided on a pub and had tea and hot chocolate. It was a really relaxed pub with some traditional live music. There was a guy playing the accordion who apparently was a really famous accordion player (who would have thought). So that was our very long day.
The next morning we woke up and some of us went to the Connemara National Park about 15 minutes away. There we climbed Diamond Mountain and took in the breath-taking sights. Again, pictures will be (or already are) on facebook. Since we climbed a mountain the previous day, I was content on just going up half way and then chilling on a rock. It was a really peaceful place. After we climbed back down the mountain we headed to Aughnanure Castle. I thought this castle was really interesting. It wasn't the stereotypical castle that you see in movies or fairy-tales or anything. But I think this was good because I got to learn about the practical uses that castles had at this time in Ireland. Apparently they put in a lot of things that were just supposed to scare their enemies and they didn't really work. For example, one of the windows where they kept their weapons was shaped for a cannon and the enemy would recognize this. The reality however is that they never did have a cannon and even if they did it was the wrong height for one. I don't remember how old the castle is by I do remember that it was the home of the O'Flahertys who were chieftains at the time. After the castle, we made the trek back to the cottages and it felt good to be home.
(Sorry how late this post is...we are kept pretty busy)
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