Pre-paddy's day (Monday): Sara, Suze, Cassie and I left in the middle of the day to take a trip to the Irish Beer and Whiskey Festival just outside Dublin. Luckily for me, they had more cider than anything else, and we had a great time with the friends we met up with there. We made friends with a lot of the brewers and some people our age who were tasting as well. There were live bands who took turns playing, and we even got up and danced a bit.
Afterwards, we found a nice burrito place, because we were feeling a bit homesick for Chipotle. Before heading home, we walked the streets, enjoying all the buildings that were lit up in green. While we walked the streets, there was a preview of the parade, and women in big paper mâché dresses were singing opera.
The actual day (Tuesday): Unfortunately, we woke up to the drunken cries of drunk Americans screaming "USA! USA! USA!" outside of our window. I've never been so embarrassed. Once they were gone we started with potatoes for breakfast and got ourselves decked in green quickly, so we could catch an early bus into Dublin. Once there, we were tossed into a sea of green and waited for the parade to start. This was by far the weirdest parade I've ever been to. They had space ships, large spiders, people dressed as raindrops, and the paper mâché ladies were back.
I was expecting something a little more Irish, there were bagpipes, and the grand Marshall was dressed as Saint Patrick, but I didn't even see any Irish dancers. We ended up leaving early and started making our own pub crawl. Our first pub was the Gin Palace, and we found a nice corner booth where we could people watch.
Next, we got a little closer to Temple Bar, but we weren't brave enough to venture in. So, instead, we went to The Vat House, which was around the corner. The pub had free hats, so I had to take one.
Next, since we were feeling hungry, we stopped at The Duke. It was supposed to have good food, but it was really just over priced sandwiches we could've made ourselves. After that, we went to O'Donahugh's where I tried a baby Guinness (it was paddy's day, I had to).
Our final bar was one called O'Neills. There, we met four very nice guys from Switzerland who we stayed and chatted with. Two of them were originally from Italy and suggested some places to visit when we go on our trip.
On our way to the train station, we stumbled across a carnival. We saw giant swings and instantly knew this was how we were supposed to end our day. We flew over Dublin and it was such a cool experience.
We stopped at The Roost before heading home and listened to their band play. Our neighbors joined us and we had a fun time trying to get them to dance.
The wind down (Wednesday): It was an extremely lazy day, but the sun was shining so we enjoyed its warmth from the kitchen. As it turned out, our neighbors were on the rugby team and had a championship match in Dublin that night. We decided to go and learn a bit about rugby and support our Irish friends. It was a great game, and Maynooth ended up winning! It was cold, but we got a nice surprise from a little fox who decided he wanted to watch too.
We are currently on our way to Belfast and won't be back until Saturday night. Can't wait to share my adventures with you all!
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