Ireland, Day 5, 1/4/09

We left our hostel in Cork today at 8:30 am, and walked to city centre to the Bus station to catch our 9:25am bus to Galway.  Our bus driver was a pleasant old Irish man, who was clearly super nice, as he pulled over to let some guy off who realized that he left his ipod in his hotel. 

On the bus, we drove through the green and pristine Irish countryside, passing through Marrow, Limerick, Shannon Airport, Ennis and arriving in Galway. While long, the ride was really pleasant...even though I saw TONS of SHEEP.

Galway is right on the water, and when we finally got off the bus, you could smell the salt in the air..it was wonderful.  We walked to our hostel, Sleepzone Galway City, which had a pleasant staff and feww 15 min internet access.  After we checked in, we walked to Eyre Square, passing the famous O'Connells, and down shopping street, which is a really pretty cobblestone street boasting the oldest Claddagh Ring shop in all of Ireland. We saw the old remains of a castle that is now a bank.  Farther down the road, we found the Spanish Arch, alongside Galway Bay.  Walking along the rocky beach, we found shards of pottery with celtic symbols on it, so once again, I felt like an archaeologist, and I snagged some for closer inspection when I got home.   We walked farther down and took some lovely pics of the Sunset over the bay.  On the walk back to our hostel, we did souvenir shopping and I bought a really unique claddagh ring!

Stopping back at Sleepzone, we got ready and went to dinner at this little hole in the wall Irish/Italian restaurant called Buon Appetito, where we had AWESOME Shepard's Pie with Mash.  Dinner was candle lit and for a while we were the only patrons, which again made it really awesome. 

After dinner, we headed to the renown pub on Eyre Square, called O'Connells, where we had Guinness and chatted with a few Irish people over a game of darts.  On our way home, we stopped to play on a playground, because we're secretly 5 years old.  Returning to our hostel, we indulged in the free tea provided and I tried this awesome hazelnut and chocolate candy bar, and we met some guys from Toulouse, France, who sadly were much less friendly after they realized we were American :(. 

I managed to find an open computer for a hot sec, and friended my British friends, which was awesome!