Day 5: Farewell to the Emerald Isle

(Dublin, as told by Julia and Sarah)

We're blogging now from Marlborough Hostel in Dublin. Since our last post we have traveled roughly 500 km, been to four cities, over a dozen pubs, and by last count we are all still friends.

After half a day in Galway the five of us packed ourselves back into our rental car, "Dooley," and trekked 198km to Cork via Limerick singing along to our Saw Doctors CD (a famous Irish band that I was introduced to four years ago) the entire time. We found that there was not a whooolllle lot to do in Cork although we all liked it for its entertaining night life, including a memorable bartender named Kane and its proximity to Blarney. Blarney is less than 15km from Cork and even after getting horribly lost and unintentionally touring the city and surrouding areas we were able to make it there in half an hour. In Blarney we met up with world-traveler extrodinaire Gill Morris and did the only thing to do in Blarney... kiss the Blarney stone!! Apparently it is suppose to give you the "gift of gab," but I'll let our readership be the judge of that!
After Blarney it was on to Dublin where we have been enjoying oursevles for two days now. Yesterday after an exhaustive day of touring, guided by Courtney-the-Ruthless, we all convened at the Pavillion, what we assume to be Trinity's equivalent of the Queen's Head Pub. At the "Pav" we met a pair of nice (re: attractive) and polite (re: entertaining) Irish soldiers, Angus and Liam, who we met up with again later last night.
This morning Kara, Courtney, Gill and Heidi departed for Amsterdam (expect posts from them shortly!) and Sarah and I have stayed behind awaiting our flight to Nice tomorrow!

AWARDS:
Best purchase: Saw Doctors CD, 10 euro. Sustained us for hours in Dooley when leg room and air was hard to come by (so I'm told -- there was actually plenty of space in the driver's seat) and stone walls and green grass stretched endlessly in front of us.
- Here's a link to our favorite tune, "N17": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlRhzRsAHQw

Favorite Pub: Howl at the Moon. Not really a pub, but a Dublin favorite nonetheless.

Thing we most need: An Alarm Clock. At first we were scared when the hostel workers banged angerily on our door to wake us up 30 minutes after we should have checked out, but that has become the norm by now, much to our hostels' shagrin.

Most heard from new Irish friends: "Why the fook would ye come to Ireland?"

That's all for now! Until next time...

Julia (edited/censored by Sarah)