Aran Islands- Amoooo

Another rough morning... but I'm living with the motto that I can sleep when I die. We woke up at 8 to catch the 9:30 am bus to where the ferry would take us to the Aran Islands. I had talked to the guy at the hostel the night before and he said it would be fine to buy the tickets the next morning. Got to the front desk, and the SAME GUY told us that in fact there was no space left on the ferry and that we should have bought tickets the night before. Bastard. We explored our options, but opted to wait until the 11:30 am bus for the 1 pm ferry. Less time on the island, but we would still get to see it. Instead, we headed to a park and soaked up the sun hoping for some kind of tan to show our families when we got home (not gonna happen). We also entertained ourselves with grapes. Or James pretending to be a seal.



Finally made it on the bus, and as I said before used it as an opportunity to SLEEP! Then made it on the ferry, and guess what, slept some more. (When Olivier gets the pictures to me I'll post some on here). Once we arrived we rented some handy bikes to bike around the island. This island was unique. There were virtually no trees and tons of rocks all around. Small stone walls formed squares over the grass, and cows and horses grazed while overlooking the ocean. The island was small and we could make it around on bikes in probably under 2 hours. I enjoyed biking (reminded me of UCSB) and loved seeing the beautiful countryside. My favorite part though was an ancient fort (I beleive it was 4000 years old) constructed on top of a sea cliff 93 m high. It's name was Dun Aengus and greatly exceeded my expectations. I think pictures and a video are the best way to see what this was like. I remember walking away thinking I wish my family had been there to see it with me:



This is the actual cliff:

A video:
T

We headed back and had a nice bit to eat at the cafe. The reason why this blog is titled Amoo is that cows in Finnland don't go moo; they go amoooo and Jussi doesn't get why that's so funny but the rest of us think it's hilarious. We gave Jussi quite a hard time at the cafe. I think it's one of those things you had to be there for.

Because we got to the island so late, we didn't make it back to Galway until around 9 and then had to transfer hostels because the one we were at was full for the night. The next hostel did not have as high of a rating; when we walked in you could tell right away. No one was at the front desk and when we said we had a reservation, the owner wasn't sure he had enough beds. He then took the next half hour to go look throughout the hostel to find out how many beds he actually had. And he was short by one bed. So I called a bunch of hostels, and all were full. I kinda felt like Mary and the no vacancy thing. It turned out fine, and he only charged us for 5 beds. But still. And the doors didn't lock to the rooms. And there was puke in the shower the next morning. But at least we had a place to sleep.

After relaxing for 2 minutes we headed out and decided to meet up with the Galway people again. Because we hadn't had a predrink, James came up with the bright idea to do 3 minute pints. I don't think I even made the first one honestly. James was always like "Come on woman" haha. But we ended up having enough drinks, and went around to different bars. It was a lot of fun once again, and after some AMAZING munchies compared to the last two nights (a kebab place the Galway people knew about). Once again we didn't make it home until around 4 am. Some highlights of the night include Luke trying to find an ATM outside in the pouring rain when there was one in the bar, and him coming back soaking wet. James couldn't find a place to pee. And Olivier walked into a tree.

James and I and our 3 minute pint:


A hilarious picture on the way home:



What a night. By now, I'm really getting to know all of these people, and loving every second of it. I have such a great time with them. Definitely miss them when I go home.

But I'm missing everyone at home... love you all.