Ireland Day 2

Okay, back to the trip. There are more pics I could upload, but doesn't look like I'm getting to that, so I'll just go with these ones that I did a couple weeks ago.

Here we are in Glenanitchaquin Park, a stop on the Ring of Beara which is a beautiful drive. This place was wonderful. You follow a path and just take in the amazing Irish scenery. This is where we knew we were in Ireland. Here Amber is chasing some sheep in a pasture that we should or should not have been in.


We're still in the park, but heading back to the car.


Here's a shot of the park from atop a hill. It's too bad I don't have a photo of some pretty waterfalls they had here too, but isn't it so beautifully green?


Heading out on this one lane road. We only ran into one other car heading in the opposite direction but we were able to get past each other with some friendly maneuvering.


This is Healy Pass, another stop on the Ring of Beara. So amazing. We got a little rain, but it usually stopped when we wanted to get out and get pictures. How thoughtful.


I know how much you all love the punk jumps and have missed them so in the last few weeks.




Here we are in Killarney. We only stayed for an hour of shopping, which was just enough since all the shops closed about then.


See all the green and gold flags. We're in County Cork alright. The winner of the All Ireland match the night before. We heard from someone that there was going to be a huge party, like 20,000 people in the town square that night, but we had to move on.



But not before Amber let evoked a little leprechaun fun.

Driving north towards our next night's stay. We put in a couple hours driving here to Kilrush where we stayed for the night.

In order to get to Kilrush, we had to take a ferry. It was windy and rainy. Probably the only time our rain coats came in handy, but we could have stayed in the car. We asked for help on how the ferry works from another driver and he offered to have us follow him to Kilrush and a place to stay. There wasn't enough room for all of us, so Sarah B, Amanda and I stayed in the pub B&B and the other three hit up a B&B up the road. It was kind of nice to be in a smaller group for a night.


The other three girls snug in their beds. I don't know why I never thought to take pictures of my rooms until later on in the trip. Oh well.

I'll try to move faster on the rest of the trip, but I'm not promising anything.

Halloween 2009

Okay, I'm so excited to show these pictures. I worked really hard on my costume and it turned out great and I got lots of compliments on it. I felt really good in it and that doesn't usually happen in costumes. So I'll definitely be wearing this one again. So on with the pics!

Amber and me dancing and probably the best picture of me of the night.


Here is the whole group about to go out. Starting with Amber as the mystery masked woman (though she didn't wear her mask often) then Melanie is the vampire, Jason aka Don Johnson, Sarah B is the Devil, Sarah D is a sexy race car driver, Amber's friend April as a sexy flight attendant.

Here I am at the second party of the night. The first was so crowded and we didn't know anyone there so it was a little much. This one turned out to be kind of mellow so we didn't stay too long at this one either. But most of my ward was there so it was fun to see everyone and their costumes. Just more closeup of me and yes I made the hat as well.

Melanie, Dallas, Me, Dustin and Carrie. Those girls are getting a little frisky, eh? I had a really good time. It was kind of funny because normally I throw my costume together that night but I had planned this one out and started it a week ago. Usually every Halloween my friends are all about the parties and getting dressed up and I'm not. This year it was the reverse. All day Saturday I was dreading the mention of not going to parties. I knew we would because everyone knew how hard I worked on my costume, but I was still worried about it. Lo and behold we had dinner before normally dressed and someone was like oh man maybe we should stay in and hang out and I burst out "No! I have to wear my costume!" I think we all had fun, but there have been funner years and funner parties. But I loved my costume and it just came together perfectly. Here's a few more pictures of me, not to be narcissistic, but just to give some better shots. I rarely like to post pictures of me so this is good.

Note to the readers

Hey everyone,

Another British Isles trip post is still coming, but I've just gotten a little preoccupied with other things. Sorry for those waiting on tenderhooks for them.

But since I don't have my pictures with me in order to complete another fabulous post on that subject, I thought I would write about something else that is near and dear to my heart....

TV & Tivo!

That's right. This handy dandy storage system of all my favorite shows has given me so much freedom. I'm an avid TV watcher. I mean avid. I don't mind admitting that I am somewhat ashamed of myself of the amount of TV I watch. But that is how it has always been. Of course, I read quite a bit too, but mostly in summer months and winter, you know when the reruns are on.

If you know me then you know how much I love movies. Well, TV shows are just mini movies. While I was growing up we only had the four basic channels and so I would watch various shows on those channels. Remember TGIF or Must See TV? Oh I was all over it. Then when I got to college the world of cable was opened up to me. I'll just tell you my pool of TV went even higher. I had to have a VCR to record things if I was gonna be gone.

When my second year of college came around, I made a pact with myself that I would not watch any upcoming new shows and as my old shows got canceled I couldn't replace them to reduce my TV watching experience. That worked for quite a few years. But then in the two or three years I threw that pact out of the window and enjoyed whatever. Again with much use of the VCR.

And I've gotten sucked into some really great and some really silly shows, but I try really hard to not let them get in the way of going out and socializing. Even though if you also know me, you'll know that socializing isn't my favorite thing to do, but I push myself. It's not hard either now with shows being aired on the internet for anytime watching its fabulous.

Several months ago a coworker gave me his old Tivo machine, it took a while for me to set it up, but once I did I have not been sorry. It is fabulous. I rarely rarely watch live TV now. I just go about doing what I need to do and then come home and watch all my lovely recorded shows. It's the best thing ever. I start to feel like a couch potato sometimes when my roommate comes home and I'm always in the same position every day. Then I'll usually stay out of the house for a few nights and then catch up on the shows later, because I can now. Better than VCR.

In case you're curious of my current television watching schedule, well I'll tell you. Prepare to be appalled or envious whichever way you float on this issue. This is when the shows air, but not necessarily when I watch them.

Monday:
How I Met Your Mother
Accidentally on Purpose
Heroes
Gossip Girl
Castle
Dancing with the Stars (usually catch on the internet)

Tuesday:
So You Think You Can Dance
V (Starting in November)

Wednesday:
America's Next Top Model
Glee
So You Think You Can Dance

Thursday:
Grey's Anatomy
Flash Forward
Vampire Diaries
The Office
Project Runway
Models of the Runway

Friday:
Dollhouse
Say Yes to the Dress
The Soup

Saturday:
The Dish

Sunday:
Desperate Housewives

There you have it. Pretty disgusting huh, but yet oh so much fun to watch!

Just a small Anecdote

So today I volunteered to read the scripture chapter for our Monday morning devotional. I did an almost fabulous job. I'm always amazed at how people read things differently (switching words around or reading completely different words) than what is right in front of them. But I was reading this verse and this is how I said it.

Alma 18:26-27
"And then Ammon said: Believest thou that there is a Great Spirit?
And he said, Yeah."

The verse really reads
"And then Ammon said: Believest thou that there is a Great Spirit?
And he said, Yea."

See the difference? I corrected myself right away but it elicited quite a few chuckles and I just said that I was giving it my own American spin.

Continue down for the next installment of my British Isles trip if you haven't already read it.

Ireland Day 1

I meant to put this post up on Friday, but Blogger was giving me troubles uploading pictures. So hopefully, there won't be as much space between posts going forward.

Anyway, today we will look at our arrival in the beautiful country of Ireland. We arrive at around 7:15 am to a very empty airport. We proceed to the bathroom and kind of get ready for the day and church because we can't get our rental car until 8:00 am. I was not in a very good mood this morning, so I stayed pretty quiet and went about my business getting ready and avoiding everyone. Once we got our rental car (and hooray that it was a seven seater so we could all be together all the time, a blessing in so many ways that we had yet to realize) and strategically fit our luggage, just barely we were off. We had three designated drivers for the job. Now you might recall that Ireland drivers drive on the left side of the road and the steering wheel is on the right side of the car. Melanie drove us into the city of Cork where we going to church. Once in the city the stress really took hold, but after two nail biting hours of finding our way we made it to the church just in time for Sacrament meeting.

I dozed off and on throughout. But it was alright and it was fun listening to a talk with the accents. We chatted with some of the congregation afterward and then we headed out, this time Amber at the wheel. By this time we had a system in place where there was the driver and a co-pilot in front who told the driver when they needed to turn what lane they were going to turn into. Then there was the navigator. Unfortunately, during Amber's turn the co-pilot told her wrong and we headed into oncoming traffic. Luckily, the Irish are smart enough to employ a sticker that is a big red 'L' that means this is a new driver so everyone was pretty nice and let us back up and get into the right lane. But Amber was pretty frazzled and I was chastised because I screamed, but I couldn't help it. It's instant reaction. After that, we all tried to remain calm for any driver. The next challenge were the signs. They didn't really give much warning before you needed to turn. I don't know how many times we would tell a driver they needed to turn somewhere and they would say I need more notice than that. Well, we tell you when we know.

Our first stop was Blarney. We checked out the castle admission prices and times and decided to head to get some cash first and then eat lunch.

You always knew where to find ice cream in this country due to these big cones.


We ate lunch in a small restaurant and Sarah really enjoyed her big beer glass of water.


Here we are! Blarney Castle, once on the grounds we were already in awe and of course took some time to get some punk jumps in, but none that really came out that great.



A more close-up view of the castle.



I'm inside one of the watch towers I think. It was all so amazing.


This is looking down into the center of the castle from the top. It was all open. The castle is just in ruins mostly.


Here we are in line to kiss the Blarney Stone at the top of the castle tower.


This is Sarah kissing the stone. She had the best picture of what it's like. This guy holding her was kind of funny, but he had the same lines for almost all of us. Asking us if we were scared and all that.


This is the Blarney House on the grounds of Blarney Castle.


Just a little behind the photo photo I thought was kind of cool.


This was probably my best punk jump and probably the last one you'll see me do. It's all about perspective on the jump. The photographer was always low to the ground looking up at us as we jumped. I probably barely got a foot off the ground.


Heading to see more of the grounds.




So beautiful!!

After we were done at the Castle we crammed back into the car and headed west to our next stop. I was kind of the navigator and tried to keep us on track. It was only an hour and a half drive so I was really pushing to get us to Kenmare. Once there we needed a place to stay. We happened upon a Bed and Breakfast that looked cute and I was sent into investigate. After some deliberating and lowering of the price we took it and we were so happy we did. It was the best night's stay we had. Check out the beds.



The bathrooms were really nice and modern too. Our hosts, Sam and Sheila were wonderful to talk to and made our stay so great. That night in search of some live music and Irish Dancing we went into the center of Kenmare. County Cork and County Kerry (that we were now in) had had a Galic Football match (sort of rugby soccer) called the All Ireland (equivalent to our superbowl) that day and County Kerry won. So there were lots of people in all the bars very drunk celebrating. We encountered many men very eager to chat with six American girls.

This one in particular took quite a fancy to me. He was crazy drunk and not attractive at all, but followed me around for quite a bit. I have other photos of him but I'm too embarrassed to post them on my blog. I was teased quite a bit about him.

After some of us got some food in us we headed back to the B&B since there wasn't much else to see and got a great night's sleep.

London

Okay here is the beginning of the details of my trip with pictures. Enjoy!

Newly Arrived in London waiting for the tube in the Underground.


Schlepping our bags to our first hotel through the city. There was a lot of this throughout the trip as we only slept in the same place twice two nights out of the whole trip. Once we got settled we headed out into the city.


The view from the top of St. Paul's Cathedral. The one and only time we climbed lots of stairs. Thank goodness.


Sarah June and Amanda



Me and Amber standing opposite the cathedral about to part ways. Since four of the girls hadn't been to London before and Melanie and I had; we separated after this so they would go see things we already saw and we would see new things.



We hit the tube station at full speed, okay not really. We kind of eased along on this day. It was nice but a part of me regrets that we didn't speed ourselves up more and get more in.


We had lunch at this little outdoor restaurant in Covent Square and I had the most delicious panini. We did a lot of people watching, which was interesting. There were quite a few street performers who when they are done verbally solicit for money. It was like they had scheduled times to perform too, because when one guy finished another one started to set up for his show. It was very interesting.


This guy was really funny and had pulled in quite a crowd. Here he is just about to walk this rope while juggling three large knives and he did very successfully. He was very adamant about getting paid, which kind of turned me off and ruined the novelty of the experience but Mel and I each gave him a pound because he was pretty entertaining. The performer right after him actually called to me as I was walking by and I tried to ignore him, but I had to turn around since the square was virtually empty now. These guys are also set up with microphones and speakers. It was really odd. Anyway some silliness ensued with me being cuddled up next to some guy sitting on the curb and the performer taking my purse and making me chase him for it. It got old pretty quick let me tell you. So we moved on.


To Trafalgar square. It's famous for Nelson's column and the National Gallery. It had a really good vibe. There was a group of mimes all copying one mime on top of a column. It was very silly.


There was also this huge art installation of a chess set as you can see behind me. It was really cool. Then we headed into the National Gallery and saw some amazing portrait work and some Monets which are my favorite. The colors were so vivid in most of them. It was amazing.


Unfortunately, we arrived at Harrods too late. It's the largest store with seven floors. We just did a little window shopping and then headed back to the hotel. The other girls had all returned already. Here is what they had been up to while we were gone.


They took the tour of Tower Castle and Bridge. Sarah Davis, Amanda and Sarah Buttars


Amber and Sarah B.


They took a river tour and passed Big Ben and the London Eye while seeing other major sites in London. They next headed to Picadilly Circus, which is similar to Time Square.


The next morning Melanie and I headed out bright and early to take the train to Salisbury to take the tour to Stonehenge. "The greatest of all the henges!" We were pretty tired due to not a very good nights sleep. Melanie wasn't sleeping well anyway and then about 1:30 am an alarm went off. Everyone thought it was my phone alarm, but no it was more like a smoke alarm or something. It eventually stopped but not too long later it went off again. I decided to unplug some things that were charging and see if that did anything and it never went off again. So we only had a few more hours to sleep.

Our train ride to Salisbury was very interesting. A guy decided to sit down next to us on the train even though there were plenty of seats elsewhere. He was pretty granola. His name was Graham and he just chatted with us for our entire trip about life and his anxiety attacks and how to him the train was like a prison because you have to buy your own water. He was pretty out there but fun to talk to. He made us laugh quite a bit and he was really nice. He did swear quite a bit, but everyone does over there. He made fun of my accent because I pronounced Salisbury wrong and made me repeat it until I got it right which I knew how to say it, it just came out a little too American for him, I guess. Anyway, I could talk a lot more about him, but we'll move on.


After a short bus ride we arrived at Stonehenge, we had an audio guide and took our time going around the circle. We took lots and lots of pictures. And while we were doing this:


The other girls were doing this:

Buckingham Palace

Big Ben

Westminster Abbey

And seeing this:
Buckingham Palace


Kensington Palace


We hopped on the train to go to Windsor. Which confused us quite a bit but we eventually got there after a really long train ride with lots and lots of stops. I had really wanted to tour the castle but we made it too late. A half hour too late.


The door is right there, but dang the cops are there too.


To say the least, I was bummed. Really Really bummed!


But the night wasn't over yet. We had a stressful train ride back to London because I knew we were going to be an hour late meeting up with the girls and I knew that they were going to be buying us tickets to a show. What show, we had no idea so if they weren't where we said to meet we were screwed. As soon as we got out of the tube station at our stop I switched on our walkie talkie. That's right I brought walkie talkies. They came in very handy at this point. We were able to get hold of the girls just as they were walking to the very tube station we were at. We met up with them down the street as a couple of the girls ran back to our hotel to retrieve our tickets that they had left for us. That's when they informed us the show was Wicked and we needed to haul butt to get to the theatre. Oh man, we were running everywhere on this trip. I was so excited though. I've always wanted to see this show.


And it was so wonderful. I loved it! I desperately need the soundtrack.

After the show we got a quick bite to eat at the train station near by and I had my most disgusting bathroom encounter ever. I can't even talk about it. Then back to our first hotel to grab our bags and head to our next hotel which we decided to stay in kind of last minute. It was really sketchy so luckily we only stayed there four hours as we had an early flight out of London. We ordered a cab and drove 45 minutes to the airport and of course we weren't there early enough and we had to run through the airport to our gate because it was final boarding, but the plane didn't even close the gates until ten or fifteen minutes after we boarded. Can I tell you , I am not a fan of the running. Then I slept most of the way to Ireland.

To be continued...

Blogging from Ireland!

We have just arrived in Dublin and finally have a chance to get on the internet. It's been a crazy past few days with non-stop running around. We finally got some good night's sleep the last couple of nights. There have been mostly good times with a few bad ones. London was crazy and Melanie and I had a good time being off by ourselves for a while. We saw Stonehenge, which was really cool, but we hung out there too long forcing to just miss the last admission to Windsor Castle. I always seem to just miss seeing my castles. But the night wasn't a total loss because we barely were able to hook up with the other girls to see Wicked in London! Which was fabulous! However, Blarney Castle totally made up for it and we all loved it. The grounds are beautiful.

We had quite a few nail biting and holding in screams moments when we started in the car in Ireland. We were all able to fit into a very small van with bags but it was a tight squeeze. It was a manual so only three of us knew how to drive and they were stressed out quite a bit the first day. We did actually head into oncoming traffic once and I couldn't help screaming. But once we got out into the beautiful countryside the girls were able to get pretty used to the roads.

We went on a very lovely drive around and a small scenic hike with waterfalls and what felt like real Ireland country. Everyone there was so excited because Kerry county won the All Ireland Galic Football and so there was lots of drinking going on. We ran into and chatted with quite a few drunk men one who even took quite a fancy to me. Too bad he was not attractive and really only had one major tooth. Unfortunately, the girls have taken to calling him my boyfriend. But he followed me around for quite a bit.

We saw the Cliffs of Moher today and it was so amazing and gorgeous. The weather has been mostly wonderful during our visit and when it rains it just kind of drizzles. Then we saw another small castle that was fun and made it into Galway, a fairly large city which is the main problem for our drivers. But we dropped off the car today and took the train to Dublin and found our latest hostel.

Can I just say that the Irish people are the nicest and most helpful people. We have been so lucky on our trip. I'll go into more detail later. But that's the gist. We'll be in Dublin all day tomorrow and then take the plane to Edinburgh, Scotland in the Thursday morning. It's just been so fast. I can't believe that's it's Wednesday already. Anyway we are doing well and being safe. Well as safe as possible. But it's been great. Can't wait to tell you all more later.