More Pictures of Salzburg

More Passport Stamps

After 10 days of planes, trains and automobiles I am back at the Park Lodge.  We had a wonderful trip and I wish I could have blogged each day! Paris was fantastic as I already said and after navigating subways, airports and streets in French we decided to give German a try.  We headed to Vienna via plane on Saturday morning and found our way to our hostel really easily!  We were so excited that the trees were changing colors and the sun was shining once again.  We had a great 3 days in Vienna-we walked around, mastered the subway and saw a lot of cool sites.  In Austria, everything closes down on Sundays which can make for a tricky planning! All the restaurants, shops, grocery stores etc.  But, we decided to tour the Schönbrunn Palace which was still open. It was the home of the Imperial families during Austria's imperial rule.  We were able to tour 40 rooms, walk through some amazing gardens, a hedge maze and played at a pretty cool park!  One of the rooms we saw was were little 6 year old Mozart played his first piano concert for the Imperial family. 

Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna

Nascht Market in Vienna!

Schokocroissant on the train! 

On Tuesday morning we left for Salzburg to visit our friends studying there.  Our train came at the perfect time and just as we were taking the escalator down into the station when we saw Emily starting to take it upwards!  It was really exciting to see someone we knew! Her aunt and uncle, a pilot, were also there visiting for a few days with some of their "pilot friends."  That night, they took us out for dinner at the Stiftskeller St Peter, which claims to be the oldest restaurant in Europe (803 AD). We had a delicious dinner and were very thankful that her family decided to take us with them! The rest of the week we spent time running around Salzburg.  The mountains were just covered with snow, but it was sunny and nearly 70 the entire week! We saw many, many Sound of Music sites, climbed the Gaisberg mountain and spent a lot of time just hanging out with the everybody. While the gazebo, fountains and paths featured in the Sound of Music were a lot of fun, the Gaisberg was most definitely the highlight of my trip. A popular mountain to climb or mountain bike up, Emily and Alex decided it was a must if we were Salzburg for so long.  On Thursday, as soon as Emily was done with class we left in pursuit of the top. We had to ascend quickly in order to beat the setting sun.  It was so warm and each time I stopped to look around, the view go better and better. After two hours of climbing straight upwards, we were at the summit.  In the distance, the Salzach river through the city was only recognizable as a thin, metallic thread weaving its way below. While we were hot and tired the oranges, chocolate and water in our packs made us forget about all our achy legs and sweat drenched shirts.  The rest of the night we met up with other friends in Salzburg who were either studying or visiting there. We introduced Emily to her first Guinness as we thought it was an acceptable time to try one with all her Irish friends along!   Our time in Salzburg was absolutely wonderful and it was a great end to busy travels! Here are only a few pictures from a great mid term break! 

Doe, a deer! 

Salzburg

Me, Mac and Emily at the summit of Gaisberg

View from the top

Does this gazebo look familiar

Oh, and a few more Paris pics! 

Notre Dame

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 We had a wonderful time traveling and I can't wait to travel with Kate Trescony come December! 

Hello from Salzburg!

Three things about traveling:  your feet always hurt, grocery shopping in a different language is not as easy as one may think and everything you see turn into "this is my favorite so far"! Without having a computer this past week to blog, I have no clue how I am going to blog all about what we have seen and did so far.  But here is a feeble attempt at Paris only.  I will blog about Austria when I get back to Galway as it is most definitely the highlight of my trip!

40 Hours in Paris.

Mac, Pat, Ben and I landed in Paris on Thursday evening.  Even with none of us knowing French we managed to figure out how to take the subway and wander down some streets until we found our hostel. With it already being late, we pretty much called it a night and rested up before our one big day in Paris.  Good choice.  The next day we woke up early ready to conquer Paris.  We were quite proud of everything we saw in one day, but our feet were not so happy.  We were extremely happy to wake up to sunshine and warm weather, a nice change from the dampness of Galway.  We started the morning at Notre Dame and  then walked along the river to the Louvre Museum.  The cathedral was absolutely amazing! As was the Louvre.   Actually, everything we have seen in the last 8 days has been amazing, so from here on out, if I mention it assume it was great! We made our way to the the Arc of Triomphe and had great time watching the crazy drivers navigate the giant, laneless round about!  We made it the Eiffel tower in the late afternoon, but then after dinner we decided to come back to go to the top! Standing inline for 2 hours was most definitely worth it.  Even though it started to pour as we go  to the top, the view was amazing of Paris at night.  It was also incredibly windy being that high up and trying to stand upright for a picture proved to be very difficult. Following the trip to the top, we bought Nutella-Banana Crepes.  YUM! For anybody that has seen the movie "Midnight in Paris" you will understand the importance of our next adventure.  The boys wanted to make sure  that at exactly midnight we would be at the steps of the church as it is in the movie.  As designated navigator for our entire trip I was in charge of getting us there.  We ran through back streets of Paris as I yelled left or right a little bit behind the boys.  Luckily, the map didn't lead us a stray and we got there with a minute to spare.  We called it a night after that since we had an early morning flight to Vienna the next day.  Paris was exactly what I thought it would be like and 40 hours isn't nearly enough time!

The Louvre

View from the top of the Eiffel 

Come back Sunday for  more pictures and stories on Salzburg including climbing mountains, Sound of Music scenes and more!  

Down by the Bay!

Today was the second day with absolutely beautiful weather! Not only no rain, but not even a cloud in the sky.  After sitting in class all morning and muddling my way through mid-term assignments, I decided to take my camera on my run.  So here you go, Mom!  This is the beach right in Spiddal!  Luckily, I was there when the tide was out so I was able to run along the beach for some picture taking.

Oh My Guinness: Dublin!

On Thursday, we headed East to Ireland's capital, Dublin.   We are starting to get accustomed to the bus rides so this three hour trip felt like nothing! Our first stop was the Rotunda Hosptial, the oldest maternity hospital in Ireland.   As the first maternity hospital, it was founded in 1745 in response to the appalling conditions in Dublin. As it is still a working hospital, the halls were busy with expecting mothers and new born babies.  We were able to get a complete tour of the beautiful gardens and main lobbies, but because of security we were not able to see the rooms.  Lucky for me, the director of our tour decided she could take a small group of students around who were interested in health careers to see more of the hospital.  We were amazed that all the rooms had 8-10 beds in them and that the hallways were extremely narrow!

Our group had dinner at the Brazen Pub-the oldest pub in Ireland! 

On Friday, we woke up to absolutely perfect, sunny weather!  Which was more than welcome since we would spend the next 8 hours walking around Dublin.  We met our Theology prof early in the morning for a walking tour.  We covered more sites and land then most of us would have liked.  Including, Trinity College, Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin Castle and more! 

Trinity College- The most prestigious university in Ireland.  We looked at the Book of Kells, which is an illuminated manuscript very similar to the St. John's Bible.  The coolest thing was the library, or the Long Room. The books are still shelved as they were in the 18th century, from largest to smallest.  We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, check out this link to see the awesome room. Long Room

We also spent a lot of time at Ireland's National Museum. I think our group would agree that the "bog bodies" was the coolest exhibit.  These bodies were found perfectly preserved in bogs across Ireland and are dated back to the 2nd and 3rd century BC.  They are so completely preserved that their hair, nails, skin and clothing are still intact! Not only were bodies and clothing preserved, but also this big chunk of butter!

Bog Butter from 150 BC

On Saturday, we headed out of Dublin to see Knowth Megalithic Tomb.  On of the most famous tombs in Ireland is 600 years older than the pyramids and 1000 years older than Stonehenge. There were over 127 large kerbstones around the mound.  This huge boulders have artwork chiseled into them and most of the boulders come from over 50 kilometers away.  There are  passages in the tomb that go East to West, during the winter and summer solstice the sun aligns perfectly with the tunnels.

And for the highlight of the weekend... Sunday we went horseback riding!  I was one of only a couple who had never been on a horse before (Thanks Mom and Dad!)  Luckily, I got a small horse, Yorkey! We practiced a bit in doors and then headed out to the fields for a trot.  It was a lot of fun and we were all happy it wasn't raining. We elected to bypass a scheduled stop at another old monastic site in order to get back early and tackle all our mid-term assignments. Now we are all looking forward to break as we all had mounds of reading and papers to write waiting at the cottages when we arrived.  Only three more days and I will be Paris bound!

It is raining cats and dogs!

Trying to write this post is proving to be quite difficult as I can barely hear my self think; the rain is so loud right now it sounds like a thousand marbles being dropped on the glass roof above me. One of the most ironic aspects of our cottage is the dining area.  The eating nook is essentially a glass box- all the walls are windows and the entire ceiling lightly tinted glass.  This design is great in intermittent periods of sun that are scattered during the day as the room heats up rather quickly!  Yet, any bit of rain and wind sounds like the cottage is caving in and that we will all find our selves spinning to the Land of Oz from the gale force winds that wind around the coast and up to our cottage.

The last week in Spiddal has been quite rainy and windy!  We have certainly been spoiled with the nice weather for most of September. The rain didn't bother us much since we had a long weekend off to just hang out in Spiddal.  This was wonderful for everyone as we were starting to feel the affects of traveling 3 or 4 days out of each week. I especially welcomed this time off to try to kick my cold! Wednesday, Thursday and Friday were spent drinking gallons of tea, watching movies and sleeping.

On Saturday, a group of us got a hostel in Galway for the night.  All 11 of us crammed into a single hostel room with only 8 beds.  Oops!  We spent the afternoon roaming around through the City Centre taking time to shop of course!  We found a wonderful  farmers market and I would have bought everything there! Luckily, I didn't have my grocery shopping bags along so I was restricted to only the produce that I could carry and eat at the time.  We finally found a good Mexican burrito place in Galway for dinner and spent the night wandering the streets and doing our own little pub crawl. Most notably, we spent much of our night at the King's Head Pub. The most famous pub in Galway as it has been around for the past 800 years.  The name of the pub comes from a tenant who lived in the building in the 1600s, Col. Peter Stubbers, who is accused of executing King Charles I. Of course, the rain and wind began that night again and we spent most of our time feeling like drowned cats.

We were lucky again on Sunday to have a day in Galway filled with sun.  Some of us went to mass at the Cathedral in morning.  The Cathedral sits on the River Corrib-the only place I've seen leaves change colors yet! Sunday afternoon was the championship match for the National Hurling Title in which Co. Galway was playing Co. Kilkenny.  Unfortunately, Galway was pulverized by Kilkenny. But, it was still fun to watch the game with the die hard hurling fans in Galway!  The entire city was filled with maroon and white banners and everyone was wearing jersey's, face paint, scarves and hats in support of our Galway team!

River Corrib

Changing leaves! 

After a relaxing week, it is time to get a lot of work done before mid-term break!  This weekend we leave for Dublin on Thursday for another excursion with the group. After that I have three days of classes before I am off to Paris, Vienna and Salzburg, Austria to visit friends!  Stay tuned.