Ireland: The Grand Adventure

Katie Martin

For The Clock

kmmartin5@plymouth.edu

This spring break, instead of going somewhere with 80-degree weather and a beach, I went to Ireland with my best friend. Although Ireland is thought mostly thought of as being rainy and cloudy throughout the year, the weather was sunny most days with shorts rain storms here ad there. Instead of staying in one place, we traveled and hit every point on the Island starting in the east with Dublin, then to the north to Belfast, south to Killarney, and west to Galway.

The people and places we saw on the way along with its amazing endless green landscapes are an experience that I wouldn’t have traded in for the world, let alone a week on a polluted beach with inebriated American teenagers with burnt skin.

Some of the high points on the trip were touring the Guinness storehouse in Dublin where the multilevel factory let us taste test its microbrews while learning the beer’s history. Ending the tour we got to listen to Irish bands play live music all night long with some American classics. The people were so friendly and helpful with endless suggestions of places to see and explore; it was as if every night we made new friends from not only Ireland, but all over the world.

While in Dublin and Killarney we met some other students at a well-known local hot spot called, ‘Temple Bar’. The students were from Lithuania, Barcelona, Wisconsin, London, and San Diego along with many other places. It’s amazing that you can meet so many people from different junctures in their lives that you can share a short-lived experience with.