Kristin is a senior journalism major and psychology minor, set to graduate right before we leave for our trip! She spent much of her younger years following her sister’s soccer team across the U.S. from tournament to tournament, so she has traveled the country quite a bit. In 2010, Kristin visited France with her high school French club, and she’s been to Canada a handful of times. As someone with Irish heritage, Kristin is excited to learn the rich history of Ireland and be able to see it all first-hand. In her free time, Kristin enjoys writing and spending time with her friends. She’s looking forward to the trip, as it offers the perfect break after graduation before she starts working full time for the summer managing the website and social media for a local high school.
Pre-Trip Blog
Welcome to my blog! By the time you’re reading this, I will have just graduated from Point Park with a B.A. in journalism with a minor in psychology. As for post-grad life, I’m fortunately feeling more stable than most — though it’s still very unfamiliar and unsettling! Back in February, I accepted a position as Webmaster and Social Media Coordinator in the Advancement Department at Seton LaSalle Catholic High School. I’m part-time right now, but will likely go full-time this summer.
I also have a part-time retail job as an assistant manager at LUSH Fresh Handmade Cosmetics. We’re the place with the colorful bath bombs that put on a wonderful show in your bathtub and perfume up your whole house.
As for travels, this is not my first international trip. I went to France for 10 days with my high school’s French Club when I was a sophomore. I’ve traveled a bit with my family for vacations and my sister’s soccer tournaments. I’ve also traveled with Helen before (who, most of you know, is teaching our International Media class). I went to Denver to present research at an Honors Conference when I was a sophomore at Point Park.
I’m really excited for this trip – after working multiple jobs both on- and off-campus for the entirety of my college career, it’s a really rewarding way to mark the end of this chapter of life. That’s the main reason I decided to go on this trip (and a sincere thank you to my parents for making it happen for me). My mom’s side of the family is very Irish, so I’m excited to see where the heritage came to be and what it’s like today. The fact that we’re also going to Iceland only made me want to go more. I didn’t know much about Iceland before taking this class, but every photo I’ve ever seen of the country’s natural wonder made me want to visit and I’m eager to see it all firsthand.
For those of you following along on our trip, I’ll be writing articles for our website on every media visit and cultural site we see as a group. For my thoughts on all of those things, plus my free time travels, I’ll be writing daily blog posts as well, so stay tuned!
DAY ONE
Well, after what seemed like the world’s longest day of travel, we’re finally in Reykjavik. We left the Pittsburgh airport around 10:30 on Saturday, and landed in JFK around noon. From there, we had a nine hour layover — I mostly knitted the whole time. I walked around the airport a bit and did some currency exchanges, but mostly just sat with classmates and knitted. Fortunately, our gate was situated near a bar that played the first period of the Pens game before we boarded our flight to Reykjavik. The flight to Iceland was only about 5 hours, which was nice. I slept most of the time, but I did get NBC on the in-flight monitor, so I got to see the Pens take it to overtime against the Senators…and eventually lose.
When we got to Iceland this morning, we met up with Jan, who has been planning these trips with Helen for years. We also met up with Rachel, who works with the tour company we’re traveling with, and Helga, who is our local Icelandic tour guide. We stopped at a little convenience store in the airport, which also serves Dunkin Donuts. For anyone who knows me, I was elated to find some Schweppes in the convenience store. It has a much stronger ginger flavor than the Schweppes in the States. I got a breakfast sandwich, and we all got on a coach bus for Reykjavik, which is about an hour from the airport.
Along the way, Helga made sure to point out the black, hardened lava covered in moss that covers most of the rural land near Reykjavik from the many volcanoes here. We stopped at the country’s national church, which is situated right in front of the president’s residence. One thing Helga said that really stood out with me was, “In a country with only 300,000 people, you can be friends with your president.” The current president is 45 years old and is a professor at a university here. He commutes to work in Downtown Reykjavik everyday, and Helga was saying he can often be seen bicycling with his children to school. There’s no term limits on presidency in Iceland, but he promised to only run for 8-12 years — the previous president held the position for 20 years. He has a stunning view from his residence (pictures to come!).
We went to another church in Downtown Reykjavik called Hallgrimskirkja. It’s a Lutheran church with massive pipe organs inside — again, pictures to come. Outside, there’s a statue of Leif Ericsson right outside the church, and the Leif Ericsson hotel is right behind the statue. For those of you unfamiliar, Ericsson is an Icelandic explorer and is thought to be the first to discover North America. I found a stray cat to pet outside — anyone who even vaguely knows me knows that I am obsessed with cats and that the light of my life is my baby Margot, so I was thrilled to see a sweet stray that was cool with me petting her.
Afterward, we got back on the tour bus and made it back to our hotel. The rooms weren’t ready, so we dropped our luggage off in storage and ventured out. We went to the flea market, which was pretty cool. I picked up a small souvenir for some family, but didn’t get anything major. There was a ton of black lava jewelry/accessories, which was pretty cool to see. One man was selling raven claw necklaces, and another necklace with a bird’s foot on it that is supposed to symbolize good luck, similar to our rabbit foot. I couldn’t understand the name of the bird, but it’s only allowed to be hunted in small numbers during the Christmas season to be eaten during the Christmas feast.
We wandered around the city a bit — checked out the bar scene, located the museums and coffee shops and mostly were looking at the prices for food. Everything is incredibly expensive here. The currency exchange isn’t that different, so for simplicity’s sake, 1000 Icelandic Krona is about $10. All day long, we’ve been sleepily trying to rearrange the decimal points to figure out how much money things are actually costing us. To put it in perspective, a plain ol’ Reykjavik t-shirt was 3900 Icelandic Krona, or about $40 — I had to pass.
We got into our hotel room around 2. I immediately took a shower and my roommate, Nicole, and I passed out for a three hour nap, though we were advised not to sleep for longer than an hour. I’ll definitely still be able to fall asleep tonight, though.
We woke up and got ready for dinner, which was at a restaurant right nearby the hotel, creatively called Reykjavik Restaurant. For an appetizer, we got cauliflower soup which was incredible, but I’m a cauliflower lover. Most people said it tasted similar to broccoli cheddar soup, but creamier. Our entree was pork tenderloins with some various sauces and vegetables on top, and a potato side that looked like a skinny slice of potato lasagna. It was also really good. I was surprised, honestly, by the bread and butter that came before the soup. The bread was pretty standard, but the butter was really sweet — in a good way. For dessert, we were given a hot chocolate cake with melted chocolate filling and banana puree as a side. There was also what can best be described as a whipped cream puck with raspberries and elderberries on top…and pop rocks, which was really interesting. Dinner was really good, and I was initially a little nervous because I know seafood is hugely popular over here, as is lamb, and I’m not the fondest of either. After a long day with little food, though, it better than anything I could have imagined.
It’s about 10:30 p.m. currently, and it’s still bright outside — probably about as bright as it might be in the U.S. at 7 p.m. in the summertime. That’s probably the most difficult for me to adjust to, since I feel like I should still be really awake and kicking given the daylight.
Tomorrow, we’re doing the Golden Circle Tour, which covers some of the natural attractions nearby Reykjavik. It’s going to be a long, windy and probably cold and wet day, but I’m excited to see more of the geysers and waterfalls that I definitely don’t see anywhere near Western PA.
As for now, I’m going to sign off and do my daughterly duty of calling my mom for Mother’s Day. 🙂
DAY TWO
Today has been jam-packed. Out of the three days that we’re in Iceland, I do feel as though today is probably going to be my favorite by the time all is said and done. We did the golden circle tour — Thingvellir National Park, Geysir and Gulfoss.
Before we took off for the tour, Helga took us for a brief walk around the part of Reykjavik we’re staying in to point out some things we didn’t know. Turns out, the town square across from my hotel that turns into a skate park at night has pillars in it and there is part of an Icelandic saga written on it, which Helga explained to us. She also showed us the parliamentary building, which is made from lava rocks. There are four creatures carved into the top of it — the story is that a man from Denmark kept trying to come to Iceland, and each time, one of the creatures fought him off and he had to go back to his homeland and tell those in charge that it was impossible to get to Iceland. There’s also a cathedral situated right beside the parliamentary building, which is very quaint and cute.
After that, we visited the Pearl, which was closed yesterday. It’s a four-story building, the top of which is a glass dome with an observation deck that offers a 360-degree view of Reykjavik. Helga said the first three floors are closed for renovations, and that they’re trying to build a glacier simulation inside. Its website also says that there’s an imitation of Strokkur outside, though I didn’t see that. Strokkur is one of the geysers in Geysir that spouts predictably every 3-5 minutes — but more on that later.
Our first stop on the Golden Circle Tour was Thingvellir National Park. It offers a number of really great views of Iceland’s biggest lake, the boundaries of which have been formed from volcanoes and their hardened lava after eruption. Since it’s pretty much separated from any other buildings, it was really cold and windy so I stopped in the gift shop and picked up an Icelandic sheep wool hat for 7000 krona, which is about $69 USD — yikes. After we had a minute to take photos and explore the surface of the park a little bit, Helga took us for a walk through what is essentially a valley. She asked us to feel one of the rocks and to be very nice to it. We all observed that the rock itself is warm and there was a bit of steam coming from its pores, but what we didn’t know at the time is that we were touching the furthest point on the North American tectonic plate. There’s a walkway between the North American and European tectonic plates, essentially making up no-man’s land. We stumbled upon a small waterfall. We kept walking a bit and saw a woman standing near the Icelandic flag singing what I presume is the Icelandic national anthem.
After our walk, we got back on the coach bus and headed to a nearby dairy farm. I tasted some salted caramel ice cream, but wasn’t feeling a full dish or cone, so I went outside to try and lure in some of the farm dogs. Turns out, one of them really really loves to play with sticks so I spent most of our break there kicking a pupper’s stick around for her to chase. I’m pretty sure it was some sort of Collie mix. There was an Icelandic sheep dog there, which looked like a smaller all-white Husky, and another one that appeared to be a black lab. I stopped by the barn and a white calf walked up to me and let me pet its head. Eventually, the stench got to all of us and we boarded the bus to our next stop — Geysir.
It’s a collection of — you guessed it — geysers. The biggest one is aptly named Geysir, but we didn’t get to see it spout. We watched Strokkur go about three or four times, since it happens so frequently. The first time, there was a group of us trying to catch it on video. We had previously been warned by Helga to pay attention to the direction of the wind, because Strokkur specifically spouts a good 30 feet in the air, and it’s boiling hot water. When it first went off, we were scared out of our pants and took off running. I still managed to get most of it on video, though, and got a couple other videos when I knew what to expect after that. We stopped in the gift shop there before we boarded the bus, but it was overpriced as well, so the only thing I bought was a hot ham and cheese, some fries, and a Sprite for 1795 krona, or almost $18. For those of you wondering, Sprite is far different here as well, much less sweet and more crisp. I’m a fan.
We left Geysir for Gulfoss, which is my favorite part of the day. Gulfoss stands for Golden Falls, and it was definitely a sight to see. It’s fairly comparable to the Niagara Falls, but it’s so much more breathtaking, since Gulfoss is a collection of MASSIVE waterfalls, all from glacier water in the mountains. We initially took a bunch of stairs down to a viewing point for what we thought was the biggest part of the falls, but then we hiked a skinny trail and climbed on some rocks basically on the edge of the falls, and we realized that it’s a collection of falls. It was nerve wracking, being that close to the edge, but also really exhilarating. We climbed back to the top of the falls and took a different trail to get an aerial view, and that’s when I realized how truly massive these waterfalls are.
It was about an hour and a half bus ride back to Reykjavik, which most of us slept for. We’re going to dinner tonight in a restaurant nearby Harpa, which is a fairly new, gorgeously designed concert hall along the water. Our dinner will apparently be on the top floor, overlooking the water, so I’m excited for the views. If last night’s dinner is any indicator, tonight’s will be fantastic, too. I’ll add a bit more to this when we get back!
UPDATE: We went to a restaurant called Sky on the top floor of a hotel. For an appetizer, most people got scallops, but I opted for the soup, which was mushroom soup. Typically, anything mushrooms makes me vomit even at the smell, but I decided to give it a try, and it wasn’t terrible. We had chicken with some barley for our entree, and we had a tarte that Nicole calls “Icelandic cheesecake” for dessert, alongside some very strong coffee.
Part of our assignment on the trip is to gather a Trump response from the people we come across on our trip. My group was assigned to Reykjavik. We talked to Kayla, who is the niece of a Point Park professor who went to university in Iceland and lives here. Then we caught two girls in the town center outside of our hotel and talked to them for a long while and they were incredibly sweet. The one girl’s name was Kristin, spelled the same way — which is popular here in Iceland. They said “We should rule the world! Us girls!” It was a really empowering conversation, and they were asking us questions about our thoughts on his presidency, too. We all are under agreement that we dislike President Trump greatly, to keep it short.
After we came back to the room, we decided to go out to a bar for a few drinks. Kayla recommended we try the Lebowski Bar, which is not far from our hotel. We ran into the girls we interviewed in the town square, and they were just as excited to see us as we were them. For 2500 krona, you can spin a wheel and win free beer. We tried it twice — once, we won one singular beer, and came up empty-handed the second time around. Colleen, who will be my roommate when we are in a quad later on in the trip, and I were at the bar and we ran into another American. Turns out, it was Derek Cianfrance, who was the director of Blue Velvet and The Place Beyond the Pines. He talked to us about how important it is to be good journalists right now. I told him my best friend, Jerimiah, just graduated as a cinema major and he was able to give me some advice to relay to him. While we were sitting at our table, I kept noticing this man at the bar who I could have SWORN was a celebrity. Turns out, it was Misha Collins, who is one of the leading actors in Supernatural.
Initially, when I told Misha I recognized him, he told me he played in Game of Thrones, which I initially went along with, but realized it wasn’t true. They definitely messed with us, but I’m sure they get approached EVERYWHERE and wanted to have some fun on their Icelandic vacation. Once I made the connection that he was in Supernatural, I told him so. I got autographs from him and Derek, who introduced himself to us as Darius. Misha then asked if we knew Vera Wang, and handed our postcards to an Asian woman beside him to sign. She was most definitely NOT Vera Wang, but we have a false autograph anyways.
We got a couple selfies with Derek and Iris, an Icelandic girl who joined us. Her friend Helena spilled beer on me, and then bought a round for all of us. I took the hit for the group, but it resulted in free beer, so it’s okay, since everything is so expensive here. We thanked Derek and Misha again for talking to us, and apologized for being “those” Americans that interrupted their evening, but specifically Derek said we need not apologized, and seemed truly so genuinely thankful for giving us the time to talk to him.
The most refreshing thing was that I felt entirely safe, both at the bar and walking back with a group of five other girls at 1 in the morning. We didn’t get cat called, no one “complimented” us or our bodies, no one made any crude remarks. Even in Pittsburgh, it’s rare for me to even walk around Point Park’s campus without being hollered at with some disgusting words and sexual remarks. Iceland as a whole has a very low crime rate, which I knew, but it was so, so awesome to not have to put up with any street harassment in a major city.
All in all, it was an excellent night. Tomorrow, we’re touring Promote Iceland, which is in charge of…well, promoting Iceland to the world for tourism. We’re also visiting the Reykjavik Grapevine, which is a free tourist newspaper in Iceland that I studied a little bit in class. Maggie, one of the girls on the trip, and I are leading the questions for the Grapevine. It’s not too early of a morning tomorrow, we have to meet as a group around 9, but we’ll be up early to get ready and have a big breakfast at the hotel.
DAY THREE
Today, we kicked off our morning with media visits after breakfast at our hotel. We first went to Promote Iceland, which is the advertising/public relations agency in charge of creating marketing that draws people in to see what Iceland has to offer. We spoke to Sveinn Bjornsson, who is a member of the communications team there. He showed us a number of different campaigns Promote Iceland put on, dating from the 2010 crisis management after the volcanic eruption that grounded many flights in Europe, all the way to their current campaign. What I found most interesting about that visit was that they moved away from promoting Iceland’s natural beauty, but rather switched the focus to the people of Iceland — nicknamed Niceland. One of the campaigns they did involved an open invite from Icelanders, asking other people to take part in their daily tasks. For instance, the now former mayor of Reykjavik extended an invitation for someone to get sushi with him, while another woman extended an open invite to pick mussels. They did another campaign encouraging people to ask an Icelander about the country, rather than turning to Google. Their most recent campaign was called Iceland Academy, which was a series of short, educational videos on proper behavior in the country — respecting the people here, and the nature. The search and rescue team here was pretty bogged down for a while, going on many missions that were easily avoidable. Iceland Academy helped lessen their demand, and people could enroll to take short quizzes and, upon completion, were entered to win a trip to Iceland. The company did a really great job of tugging at your heart strings and really capturing the country in short videos. They were all really humorous, which I thought was very appealing. Someone from our class asked Sveinn if they fear the humor won’t translate to other countries and his response was fairly simple, “We don’t care.” He spoke a lot to the authenticity of Icelanders, and told us an Icelandic saying that really stuck with me: “Answer the doors in the clothes you’re already wearing.”
We had about an hour break between the Promote Iceland visit and our visit with the Reykjavik Grapevine newspaper/magazine. We were in our hotel lobby booking our trip to the Blue Lagoon when a couple Icelandic girls came up to our group of six and asked if we speak English. She said they were filming a music video at a venue right around the corner, and asked if we would be extras. Knowing nothing about it, we booked our Blue Lagoon tickets and followed her to Hurra, a small bar and venue that had vibes similar to Mr. Smalls in Pittsburgh, but probably about a third of the size. We were instructed to chat amongst one another and keep our energy high, talking with our hands and really laughing as if we were partying in a club setting. We all felt VERY out of place, having dressed professionally for our media visits in a club full of really cool and stylish Icelanders. A girl who introduced herself to us as Solrun started talking to us a bit. She said she didn’t know any of the other people in the club, except for her girlfriend, who was starring in the music video, and the singer whose video we were in. We chatted a bit and later found out that she and her girlfriend are starring in the music video together. The girl who originally recruited us as extras said we would be in the forefront of the shot, so our energy was the most important. Although we felt really out of our elements, we did the best we could and left just in time to meet up with the group to head to our next media visit. Karo is the singer, and the video for her song “Overnight” should be on Youtube in about three weeks, so I’ll be a cameo in an Icelandic music video, which is pretty cool.
We also visited the Reykjavik Grapevine, a free tourism newspaper that I covered a bit in class for a project. Their offices were very small, located in a couple different small rooms on the third floor of a building in downtown Reykjavik. It reminded me a lot of The Globe — a couple small rooms in a stuffy upper-floor level, and absolutely nothing fancy. We met the publisher, Editor-in-Chief, managing editor, art director, photo editor and ad salesman there. They spoke to us about the process of writing a paper designed for tourists, but with information that still appeals to Icelanders. They described how they must over-write for Icelanders, but under-write for tourists. They said their writing involves a lot of introducing and explaining subjects various times, which Icelanders can mostly skim over, but which is vital information for tourists. Everyone we met from the Grapevine fit exactly into Sveinn’s saying, “Answer the door in the clothes you’re already wearing.” They were all dressed very casually, they didn’t care about speaking in any professional manner or trying not to swear. The art director referred to the paper as a “freak,” having said that the content in the paper is all about culture, but the ads are all for tour bus events. It was cool to see the very small staff behind the newspaper that I’ve been researching and reading all semester. I found it really interesting that none of the Grapevine staff finished their college education, but they found a gap in the market and decided to fill it and have been doing so since 2003. They even offer 3-month internships, which they encouraged us to apply for. However, they can’t offer any pay other than some meal vouchers, mostly from their advertisers and the cost of living in Iceland is so high that it probably wouldn’t be feasible.
Once we got back, we had a brief group meeting with a recap of the day and our favorite things about Iceland. We went over a little bit of information for tomorrow’s trip, and as soon as the meeting was over, my friends and I prepared ourselves for The Blue Lagoon! I went with Nicole, Jess (who I’ve been doing a lot of website planning with), her roommate Colleen, and Caite and Maggie, who are rooming together in Reykjavik. We got on a bus right outside of our hotel, that took us to a bus station where we got on a bigger bus. It was about a 45-minute bus ride to the lagoon. I upgraded my package when I got there for about $20, which gave me another face mask (there’s a free silica mask, and the algae mask is additional), a free drink, and a towel. Once we all got suited up, we had to shower off before we went in, which we learned is a very important step to Icelanders, as they really value hygiene. We spent about three hours in the water — it was so relaxing for my muscles and I could feel my skin getting softer by the minute. After both the masks, my face is feeling incredibly refreshed and supple. My free drink was a sparkling strawberry wine, and I bought a cider that tasted somewhat like an apple and pear combination. Both the face mask bar and the actual bar were level with the water, so we didn’t even have to get out of the lagoon to get our luxuries. 🙂 We stopped at the cafe for a quick bite to eat before we caught the bus back to the city hall — I had a chicken panini, which was pretty good, but nothing to write home about.
It’s about midnight right now, and our call time for the morning is 2 a.m. Though I’m really tired, Nicole and I both agreed that going to sleep now is going to make it all the harder to get up, so we’re committed to staying awake. Our bus leaves the hotel at 3:15 for Keflavik airport, and we’re flying to Dublin tomorrow.
I’ll be writing stories for the website on all the media visits, so stay tuned for more about those (which MIGHT not be up until the trip is over, depending on how much time falls in the itinerary.
DAY FOUR
We had a 2 am wake up call to get our stuff together and meet in the lobby to leave for the airport at 3:15. Since we didn’t get back from the Blue Lagoon until 11, we decided getting up would be harder if we did sleep, so we opted not to.
We mostly just laid in the hotel and mostly laughed at nothing in our state of slap happy delirium. Nicole and I decided to go for a walk in Reykjavik to go to 1011, which is their 24-hour convenience store similar to 7/11. It carries a lot more grocery items than 7/11, though. I got a panini and some snacks, but didn’t end up eating any of it. I realized afterward I didn’t have much of an appetite.
I tried to sleep on the bus ride to the airport, but wasn’t successful. We had a little while to wait once we were there, and I was able to fall asleep for about 30 minutes before we boarded, and I fell asleep as soon as we took off. I slept for the entirety of our three hour flight and woke up just as the pilot announced we were preparing for landing in Dublin. We descended pretty fast, and we made very rocky contact with the runway. Before I knew it, we were up in the air again and the pilot announced that the first attempt was poor, and he was going to try again. The second landing was much smoother — my guess is he was just the trying to land too fast.
Once we got our luggage and headed back to the bus, our tour guide, Joe pointed out a few things on our ride from the airport to downtown Dublin, some places we should try to visit while we’re here and whatnot.
We had about two hours for lunch. We were so tired by this point that we just wanted to sit, so we found a nearby place called KC Peaches. We got a to go box and filled it with buffet food, all got a coffee and sat and ate for a while. We walked around a very little bit and popped into a couple shops, but I didn’t buy anything because it’s all very touristy, which I’m trying to get away from.
Once we all met up, we went for a guided tour of the Parliament building here. We were able to go to the upper level and watch from behind a glass wall as they proceeded through the equivalent of a senate session. At one point, one of the people in our group realized there was a BIG spider crawling down its web from the ceiling, and was hovering over our shoulders. Luckily, we were able to remain silent, but we all jumped out of the way. The security guard there came over, chuckled, picked it up by its web and disposed of it.
I started to get really interested in their discussion just as we were pulled from the room. One of the women was speaking about police wiretapping phones and she was pretty heated. Most everyone was interested in that, but we were also so exhausted that it took quite a while for us to process what was happening. We were so tired, even Helen was dozing off. We got a tour around the rest of the building and went to sit in for what I believe is the equivalent of their congress. Again, I got really interested when one woman was making her case for changing the law — apparently, a while back women who get pregnant from premarital sex had to give their children up for adoption. I don’t know the full magnitude of its enforcement, but as soon as that discussion was getting started, we were pulled out of the room to carry on with our tour again. We weren’t allowed to take any pictures in the Parliament building, so I don’t have much to show for today.
As soon as we left, we learned that their prime minister announced his resignation effective at midnight that evening — everyone’s been pointing out that we were lucky to be there on such a historical day. Since he resigned and the people don’t vote on it, someone else from his party will be selected for the position
We went back to our place, which is an apartment. We had to go grocery shopping since there’s no complementary breakfast. After that, we went to dinner at a place called the Brazened Heat which is Dublin’s oldest pub. We had a Greek salad as an appetizer, a Guinness stew and chocolate cake for dinner. I had a beer — Smithwick’s Pale Ale. It was really good and only €6, compared to like 12.00 in Iceland.
I was so tired when I got back to the room that I showered and pretty immediately went to sleep, which is why I’m uploading two blogs now.
DAY FIVE
This morning, I got ready and Nicole and I went to grab coffee before we ate some of the food we got for breakfast. We left this morning to go to Dublin City University, where we got a lecture on Irish media from a professor there. We learned a little bit about the project she’s behind, called FuJo – the future of journalism and media. It was cool to learn how conservative the media used to be and how little respect it had for women. We grabbed lunch at the cafeteria there and left for Harmonia Publishing, which is the largest magazine publisher in Ireland.
At Harmonia, we talked to the CEO, director of advertising, director of sales, and two editors. It was really cool to hear about their process and how similar it is to the things I’ve done so far, but also how much broader it is. They publish 18 magazines and they don’t have many people on their staff, so they’re all keeping very busy.
We got a €45 cash dole for dinner for he next three nights. We came back to our apartment and Maggie and Caite came over. We were all sipping on some of the wine we bought and eventually we headed out to Trinity, which is a bar and venue. I got a fried fish cake appetizer and a sweet chili chicken sandwich, which was pretty good, but not unlike something you might find in the states. I had my favorite drink, a Jameson and ginger ale and the obligatory Guinness. For what it’s worth, Guinness is so much smoother and much better here than it is in the states. I spent most of my dole already.
After Trinity, we stopped to talk to some locals to ask for a place to go that isn’t touristy and their recommendations were a bit of a walk, and it was already getting late. We stopped at a club around the corner called Czech Inn and had a drink. We thought we were going to dance, but the place was basically empty so we just ended up spending most of our time there talking to the bartender, who is from Venezuela, here to study graphic design. He said the inflation is so high in his country that just a few nights’ tips would be the equivalent of 5 years’ salary for his mother, who works for the government there. He has no plans to go back, and is actually trying to save up enough money to prove he can support his 18-year old brother so he can get him a visa to come here to Dublin.
We’re going on more media visits tomorrow — my stories are piling up, and I’ll admit I’m a little worried about getting them all done before we have to turn in all of our assignments, but I’d rather write them all when we get back so I can soak up as many cultural experiences while I’m here.
That’s all for now, folks.
DAY SIX
Today we met up in the lobby to go to Heneghan PR, which is an affiliate of a firm in Pittsburgh. The Pittsburgh office is part of one of the biggest PR firms in the world, according to Bob, the Advertising and PR professor with us on the trip. We talked to the CEO, which is cool. We also talked to the CEO of Harmonia yesterday. It’s kind of interesting because I feel like it would be either impossible or lots of jumping through hoops to talk to anyone that high in a company. Anyway, at Heneghan, we also got to hear from an American from South Carolina who’s been interning there. I’m not much into PR, so it was a little out of my realm. They talked a lot about their crisis management and how well trusted they are for that. They also spoke humbly, saying they won’t take on a client out of their wheelhouse. If they aren’t familiar with the product or industry, it hurts both parties’ reputations.
After that, Michael Chester from the Press Photographers Association of Ireland talked to us. It was really cool to him because he was as truly Irish as it gets — he was genuine and didn’t hold back his language, jokes, or Dublin slang. We also heard more about him and his work rather than so much about the PPAI, which I appreciated. I like to hear about these speakers’ average workday, and though his is anything but predictable, it was cool to hear. The entire PPAI is very trusted in Ireland and has a lot of ins with the government. He said he had the now-retired prime minister’s phone number and could call him, which he did the day he announced his resignation. He said the prime minister picked up from a pub and talked to him. He was also the only photographer asked and permitted to photograph a notable Irishman’s funeral. He was a really funny guy, but he gave us a lot of advice as well.
We got on the tour bus and headed to Trinity University in downtown Dublin, home of the Book of Kells. It was jam packed, so I was only in the museum briefly. We weren’t allowed to take photos, so I bought a couple postcards in the souvenir shop. I stopped to talk to a few students about college life for my story. They provided a lot of insight. They said there isn’t tuition, but there’s a registration fee of $3000 for Irish students, $7000 for European students and $20,000 for students who live in North America or outside of the EU.
We went out to eat at what seemed like a very small place off one of the side streets. Inside, it was actually very big and several stories tall, but there were several different rooms and every table was packed. We couldn’t find a table big enough for the whole group, so some of us stayed and Nicole and Jess found a different place to go. It was interesting — there was a big buffet of food and you ordered it cafeteria style. I got cauliflower soup as an appetizer, and it was nowhere near as good as what I had in Iceland. I think there was fennel or something in it giving it hints of black licorice, and I hate black licorice. I ordered fish and chips as my main course, and that was really good. We went out to a few different pubs and came back for the night.
DAY SEVEN
We had an entire Saturday free in Dublin today. The plan was to leave at 10 a.m., but I had a really rough time falling asleep last night. I woke up very groggy and said I might have to meet up with the group after they leave, because I just needed more sleep. I quickly realized I didn’t want to have to try to find out where my group is when wifi isn’t guaranteed, and no one can send texts without it. Turns out, everyone else had slept in, too, so we didn’t end up leaving until noon.
We’ve seen a bunch of people carrying Penney’s bags — different from JCPenney’s. We saw someone at Heneghan PR yesterday and Jess really, really loved her shirt, so she asked her where she got it and sure enough it was only 13 euros at Penney’s. We decided we would go there today, but on our journey, we found a place called Carrol’s Irish gift shop. I got myself a ring, the obligatory Guinness shirt and a Dublin hoodie. I picked up some souvenirs, too. Penney’s was really cool. It was sort of like H&M or Forever 21, but there’s a large men’s section, a homewares section and a kid’s section, in addition to women’s. It was three stories, and everything is priced really reasonably. I ended up finding a really cute duffel bag carry-on for 15 euros, and a pair of sunglasses for 4.
We left that corner of town to head to Grafton Street, which is one of the main shopping streets. We were all hungry, so we stopped for lunch at a place called Bruxxels. I had vegetable soup, which was okay, but nothing to write home about, and more fish and chips — not as good as the previous night’s dinner. After that, Nicole and I wanted to visit the LUSH here. I work at the one back home, and Nicole just left. They had some products that we don’t have in the States, like mouth wash tabs and gourmet soaps, so I picked up a couple things.
We came back to the hotel to set our stuff down and plan the rest of the evening out. We got a 24-hour transit pass to use on our free day, good for the bus, the tram, and the train. We were planning to take the train to either Bray or Howth, which are seaside towns, to have a nice dinner. We left and it started raining and then the rain turned into hail. Some of us weren’t dressed the best we could have been for the weather, so we all turned around to change or grab rain jackets/umbrellas. Right as we were about to walk out the door, I got really nauseous and ended up getting sick. I decided I didn’t want to walk 30 minutes to a train station and take a 30 minute ride and walk however long until we found a restaurant we wanted to eat at, so I just stayed in the room. I got sick a few more times before I was able to fall asleep for a couple hours.
I wanted to go to the nearby convenience store during daylight so I could buy some ginger ale and get something light to snack on, but it was dark by the time I woke up and my group was still gone. I didn’t want to go by myself in the dark, so I’ll just eat something in the morning, I suppose.
We’re headed off to Belfast in the morning. Dublin has been okay, but I can’t say I’m the biggest fan at all. As for now, I’m still not feeling great, so I’m off to bed.
DAY EIGHT
We got a high speed train to Belfast today. I slept most of the way, and woke up feeling much better than I had the night before.
Once we got to Belfast, we stopped at the Belfast City Hall and went to a small cafe there to get lunch. I had a sparkling pink lemonade and a chicken and broccoli pie, which was really good. We got back on the bus and met up with our local tour guide, who showed us around Belfast from the bus. We drove by the Titanic Shipyards and the Titanic Museum which just recently opened. The design of the building is really cool, there are shards of aluminum covering the angular sides. Our tour guide said the locals refer to it as the iceberg because of its design, however inappropriate it may be. She showed us Titanic Studios, which is where the majority of the indoor Game of Thrones scenes are filmed.
We drove to the Belfast Castle, which overlooks the harbor. As we got off the bus, she told us about the castle’s cat garden. Imagine my disappointment when I found there were not living cats in the garden, but rather cat sculptures and mosaics. Apparently there is one white cat who lives at the castle, and it’s good luck to see it — I didn’t see it.
Along our travels, she pointed out all the murals on the walls of Belfast — some of them with messages for keeping Northern Ireland with the U.K., others for a united Ireland, and some for peace all together. We drove through the Catholic and Protestant streets — it’s really interesting that there’s no real border between the two but there is absolutely a divide between the people there. The coolest part was when she took us to the peace walls that used to be the divide during the troubles. They’re covered with murals and artwork now, but it’s a tradition for tourists to sign the wall, so that’s what we did too. It was really moving to see signatures of people all over the world all wishing for solidarity. I was most taken aback by all the marks people left with messages like “no walls anywhere,” “let this wall be remembered only in history books,” “we tore our walls down and hope you do too (Beirut)” and of course some similar messages from Germany. It was a weird moment, knowing that we could potentially have a wall in the States that is most assuredly not peaceful.
After we signed the peace wall, we checked into our hotel. The credit card hadn’t gone through yet due to the currency exchange, so it took a minute to check in. Nicole and I set our stuff down and freshened up before we met up with Maggie and Caite to go to the pub across the street. When we walked in, an Irish man was immediately way too excited to see a group of young girls. He was asking if we were here for a hen’s night or a bachelorette party, and seemed astounded when we said we were on a school trip. The bartender asked him to leave us alone and then he showed us a small, private room behind the bar where we could hang out without being bothered.
We met up with the group for dinner at McHugh’s, which was established in 1711 and is in Belfast’s oldest building. I had a Caesar salad as an appetizer, and it confirmed that bacon is a regular and delicious part of Caesar salads here. I had pan roasted chicken with leeks and a big potato pancake for my entree. Dessert was a sticky toffee pudding, which was more of a toffee-chocolate cake with ice cream and toffee flavored drizzle. It was good, but heavy for me.
After dinner, a small group of us went to a pub called the Dirty Onion. I had a Guinness and some rhubarb ginger gin drink, which was really tasty, but not something I could drink on the regular.
We came back to the hotel and I showered. We have a later day tomorrow and don’t have to meet up with the group in the lobby until 11:30, so I’m going to sleep in a little.
DAY NINE
Today, I planned to get up around 8:30 to catch the hotel’s breakfast before it ended at 10 and go back to the room and get ready, but I ended up sleeping until shortly after 10. I slept through all my alarms and probably wouldn’t have woken up if Nicole didn’t come back into the room, so I’m thankful for that.
I got ready and was going to see what my little group was up to, but they were already out and about on a walk of the city, so I just hung out in the lobby of the hotel and posted yesterday’s blog and got the format and everything set for today. It was a quiet and peaceful morning
We’re going to the Irish News today, which is a newspaper here. After that, we’re headed to BBC Northern Ireland, and I’m told we’re going to get lunch there so I’m not too upset about missing breakfast. I haven’t had much of an appetite on this trip. But, while I was waiting for everyone to meet up in the lobby, I went over and there was still some stuff left. There were individually packaged muffins, so I snagged one of those for my purse and made a small ham and cheese sandwich.
We walked to BBC Northern Ireland and talked to one of their reporters and the news lead there. They provided a lot of really insightful information on what the state of BBC Northern Ireland was during the troubles, showing us a video of the building being bombed. Since it’s part of the U.K., it was a target during that time. They did say that Belfast has the largest number of stations and the largest studio of the BBC family outside of London, and they credit a lot of that to people’s interest in the news in Northern Ireland because of the Troubles. They had a lunch spread for us: some sandwiches, coffee, tea, water and lots of fresh fruit. We all refreshed a little bit before we went for a tour of the place. I was in the TV gallery, which is essentially the control room behind the studio. We got to be there for the 1:30 program, which cuts into the national program with local news and weather. After we watched all the behind the scenes action, we went to the studio and talked to the anchors and all the people running the camera. The coolest part, to me, was seeing how all of it comes together. I’ve been a part of the Point Park newscast before and stood in the same room and was baffled even by how our limited amount of equipment produced this crazy professional looking show, but it was even more baffling in a room with tons more equipment that is ten times more advanced. I found it really interesting at the end of the show that they brought someone on to sit beside the anchor and she repeated the gist of the stories she referenced earlier, and the man next to her used sign language. I asked, and that’s something they do at the end of every show.
After we left there, we took a 20-minute walk to The Irish News, which is the leading newspaper in Northern Ireland. Their competition, the Belfast Telegraph, has since switched to more of a tabloid style that focuses much more on celebrities, entertainment and show business in an attempt to draw in more readers. When Jess brought that up to one of the people we spoke to there, he said he wasn’t there to trash talk or comment on the competition, which I thought was really classy. In Pittsburgh, if you talk to anyone in the field of journalism at all, they have strong opinions and preferences. If you’re talking to someone who works for either of the two papers and mention the competition, you’re in for a lengthy conversation about how terrible the other one is for a multitude of reasons. What was most interesting to me is that the staff there is relatively small for its reach, and they’re the only newspaper in the area that experienced an increase in subscriptions. That’s great news for me as a journalist, but there was on factoid that made my jaw drop: their subscription increase is from the 16-21 age group. Everyone has been struggling with how to engage the younger generations to read news, and how to get them to pay for news and services online. They didn’t specify if those increases were specifically print or online subscriptions, but regardless, that was really cool to hear. The director of marketing, who was telling us all of this, said that he thinks it’s in large part because of Donald Trump. He said young people are infatuated by him and they want to read and know what is going on in the United States, and they are working to gain a better understanding of our political system. The visit at the Irish News was probably my favorite one so far, and it lasted about two hours.
After those visits, we were free for the day. So, my group split from the larger group and we were looking for an inexpensive restaurant for dinner because the cash dole for tonight was only 15 pounds. We were trying to go to a restaurant found in a travel book called Fish and Chips. Colleen is sick with a cold, and Jess and I are getting it, so we wanted to stop at a pharmacy to pick up some medicine before they all closed for the evening. We stopped at a place called Boots, which is incredible and I really wish we had it in the U.S. It carries drugstore makeup brands and luxury makeup brands like an Ulta might, but it also has a full pharmacy, haircare, baby necessities — pretty much everything but food. It wasn’t that expensive, either. I spent about 25 pounds and I got some Sudafed, a travel sized hand lotion and body spray, deodorant and some NYX eyeshadow and lip color.
After we left Boots, we were back en route to Fish and Chips. We finally got there and realized it had closed about ten minutes before we got there. Everyone was pretty hungry and definitely tired, so four of us walked into the closest place we saw, and the other two went to McDonald’s. I was with Colleen, Jess and Nicole as we went to a place called Robson’s (I think?). They had a 3-course meal deal for 15 pounds, so I ordered nachos as an appetizer. They were pretty spicy, but really good. They had real cheese on them, instead of the bright orange liquid cheese that is all over the U.S. I had fish and chips as an entree, because it’s what was on my mind. The chips (fries) were cut super thick and had a strange flavor to them, so I wasn’t much a fan of that. There’s no Heinz ketchup over here and whatever they gave us tonight was very sweet. I left my chips. All fish and chips in Ireland so far have come with “mushy peas,” as it says on the menu — just mashed peas. I’m not a pea fan, so I haven’t tried it. The first couple times I got it, I really thought it was guacamole and I was at first afraid, since I’m allergic to avocados, but also confused as to why some battered fish would come with guac. Anyway, for dessert, I got something called pavlov. I ordered it blindly, with no idea what it was. Apparently, it’s a meringue tower with some marshmallow cream and whipped cream on top. It came with some strawberries and grapes on top, raspberry and mango drizzles and a scoop of ice cream. I really dislike meringue and it made me feel like my teeth were going to fall right out of my head, so I ate the fruit and the ice cream.
I was really tired after dinner, so I came back to the room and FaceTimed with Jon before I got in the shower. The rest of the group went out drinking. I’m a little over alcohol, super tired, and I think I’m getting a cold so I decided tonight would be an early night for me. It’s a little after 10 p.m. and we have to meet in the lobby by 8:45 with all of our stuff tomorrow to go to Galway. I’m most excited for Galway — everyone I’ve met in both Dublin and Belfast have swooned as soon as the word comes out of my mouth. They say it’s the prettiest and full of the nicest people. I’m excited because we’re going to take in a lot more nature while we’re there, and I must admit, I’m a little city-ed out.
Anyways, that’s all for today!
DAY TEN
Today we left Belfast for Galway, which everyone in Ireland and elsewhere has told me is the best stop. They weren’t wrong.
We had a bus ride and stopped briefly in Kells, former home of the Book of Kells. We stopped in a church that was built in 804, which was really cool to see. There’ll be pictures on my Facebook! It was a really small town, definitely the kind of place where everyone knows one another. We also stopped in another town which I can’t remember. We went to a small cafe and I had a chicken Caesar wrap that was really tasty.
We got back on the bus for Galway and passed lots of beautiful scenery along the way — lots of farms and cows. Once we got to Galway, we checked into our hotel briefly before we headed out for the city. We’re about 1 km from the city center, which was around a 40 minute walk. We saw the shopping and the bar district. We split from the group and went to a restaurant called Quay’s, pronounced Keys which has been screwing me up hardcore. I had seafood chowder as an appetizer — it was really good but I got a little nauseous when I saw some tentacles. I had fish and chips as an entree again, which was good but not the best I’ve had.
After that, we wanted to go to a pub where Ed Sheeran recently shot a music video, but we realized it was a 35 minute walk away from our hotel so we opted not to go for that.
Before we stopped at our next location, I picked up the last of my Mother’s Day gift for me mum. That’s about all I can say about that because I know she’s quite the loyal reader of these things.
We went to a different pub close by and talked to an Irish man named John over some Guinness. He’s an engineer who is behind the building of lots of ships, among other things. He was really cool, he said he hopes to see me on CNN, although I tried several times to clarify I’m a writer, not a broadcaster.
We stopped at another Irish pub our tour guide Joe recommended to us. It’s Irish name is Seagan Ua Neactain. I didn’t get anything because he said a shot of Jameson was €7.50 and that doesn’t include the little bottle of ginger ale to mix with it.
We went to a pub called the Dail afterward, and I ordered from one bartender and then accidentally ordered from another one who looked identical to him, so I ended up with two drinks…whoops.
Once we all finished our drinks, we decided we were sleepy enough and had a long enough walk ahead of us, so we started the trek back. It was a 40 minute walk to downtown Galway, but we were with our whole group of about 20 people, and it only ended up taking us about 25 minutes to get back. In true American fashion, we stopped at McDonald’s on the way back to the hotel, because nothing complements a buzz quite like the savory salty crisp of those shoestring fries, right?
Tomorrow, we have our last media visit at Galway FM and the rest of the day is free, so I plan to finish up my shopping. I need to pick up just a few more things, and wouldn’t mind some souvenirs for myself from Galway either. I shall blog about my findings tomorrow!
DAY ELEVEN
Today we toured Galway Bay FM. It’s the leading independent radio station in Ireland outside of Dublin. I learned, though, that there are many stations in Dublin who call themselves independent, but are part of a group called Independent News Media, whereas Galway Bay FM is family owned and is totally a standalone station. We got to sit in as Keith Finnegan, host of their flagship show and basically runner of all things Galway Bay FM, did his show. His daughter, Katie, is is current producer — but, they change producers every 5-7 years to keep things fresh so Katie is likely going to relocate to Chicago and they’ll have a new producer.
We also got to talk to their sports host, which is pretty cool. He’s definitely a guy who really, really loves his job. He was telling us that every Sunday, they do a 4.5 hour program that is totally commercial-free and doesn’t include any music. He was saying how exhausting it can be, and how it sometimes makes him hoarse, but it’s worth it because people in Ireland really love their sports, particularly in Galway. The way he described it sounded a lot like Pittsburgh. He said whatever sport is happening at the time is backed by everyone in Galway, and there are rivalries between teams outside of Galway, but everyone here is pretty much a fan of every team here. He was saying they had about 1 million listeners during last year’s hurling tournament. He also said that American football is really big here, and there’s even interest in the Stanley Cup since they get ESPN here. When we said we were from Pittsburgh, he said, “Ah, yes. Steelers, Penguins, Pirates,” as if he’s been familiar his whole life.
It was really, really hot in the radio studios. I thought I was the only one who felt this way, but one girl in our group actually passed out in Keith’s studio while he was doing his show. He apologized for not noticing, but mentioned that he gets into a zone everyday that he doesn’t get out of until the show is over. After we took tours of the facilities, we all sat down and talked to Keith for about an hour. He said this was definitely not the first time someone has passed out in his studio, and he even got a new air conditioner installed to try to combat the problem.
It was interesting to talk to him — he’s an all business guy. He said he doesn’t mind if someone makes a mistake once, twice or even three times, so long as they own up to it. He was very adamant that his new hires find stories on their own apart from Google or social media. He believes that they should be reporting the news first, and then the newspapers can have it. He said he wasn’t sure what we had been told so far, but newspaper in Ireland is dead in the water. It was an interesting contrast to what we heard at the Irish News, that they are experiencing subscription increases, particularly from the younger demographic. When we went to Dublin City University, we heard that radio has always done well in Ireland because the Irish are natural born storytellers, and radio is the perfect place to hone in on that skill.
After we left Galway Bay FM, we were free for the rest of the day. The group I’ve been hanging out with all trip split from the pack fairly quickly and started the 30-minute walk downtown. It was really hot outside today, too, which I was definitely unprepared for. Since we were going to Iceland first, I packed warmly and tried to pack in layers so I could shed some once it got warmer here in Ireland, but I wasn’t prepared for the 75+ degree weather with such direct sunlight. We all stopped at the first restaurant we saw, since we were very hungry and the hotel’s breakfast was pretty small. I got a buffalo chicken wrap that came with fries and a small salad. It was pretty tasty, but I started to feel not so hot almost immediately after we left.
I went to the main shopping streets and picked up a few more souvenirs. I checked my boyfriend Jon, my dad and my best friend Jer off of my list today. I picked up a little something for my two year old red-headed nephew, Jaxx — it seemed obligatory to get the little ginger something green. 🙂 I did my shopping fairly quickly, but by the end of it, I felt like I was going to be sick. I committed to walking back to the hotel, but had to bolt into a McDonald’s, where I unfortunately lost my lunch. I felt bad about puking in their bathroom, so I bought a Sprite and continued the walk back to the hotel. Once I finally got back, I was sick once more before I took a cold shower and ended up falling asleep for about four hours. I still didn’t have an appetite when I woke up, but I went down to the hotel’s restaurant to hang out with Nicole, Maggie and Caite.
Tomorrow morning, we leave to visit the Cliffs of Moher, which I’m really excited about. It’s been the spot I’m most looking forward to in Ireland, and my mom is antsy for tons and tons of pictures. After seeing the wondrous nature that Iceland has to offer, I’m still craving more and that’s something even the most charming cities can’t offer. Tomorrow happens to be our last day abroad, as well. We’re having a medieval dinner at Bunratty Castle tomorrow evening to close out the trip, and we leave Friday morning to come home. I’m so excited to be back in the states. I don’t think I can intake anymore fish and chips, Guinness or Jameson for quite a while. I’m excited to be in legitimate air conditioning, cuddling an adorable orange kitty and sleeping — kicking off post-grad life the proper way, I’d say.
DAY TWELVE
Today we finally saw the Cliffs of Moher. As I mentioned in my last blog, after being in cities, I was so excited to see some of Ireland’s nature. The drive to the cliffs was beautiful, full of rolling green hills and lots of sheep and cows. I found it really interesting on the drive that I rarely saw any black or black and white cows, mostly just brown and white. I have very minimal farm animal knowledge, to say the least, but in America it seems like black and white cows are the only ones represented. There were also tons of sheep, horses and donkeys — since it was a warm day, most of the animals were either sprawled out in the grass or laying under the few trees we did see in an attempt to find shade.
We stopped somewhere between Galway and the cliffs to see a limestone field. Our Irish tour guide, Joe, warned us several times to watch our steps because there are cracks called grikes that formed naturally between the limestone that would break ankles, and even said one of his colleagues had two broken ankles in the past three years on his tours. Thankfully, that didn’t happen to anyone on our trip. It was really pretty, but I have to admit, it was pretty dangerous. I was surprised to see about 3-4 groups of private elementary school classes there on their field trips. At one point, one of the little boys wanted to kill a bug and I heard his teacher shout, “No, no! Don’t do that! He’s just on his school trip, too!” and the kids’ enthusiastic reactions to her comments were adorable. I got lots of photos of that, which I posted to my Facebook account for anyone looking to see.
We stopped at another little town shortly after that for a bathroom and coffee break. It was really warm again today, so I wasn’t feeling a coffee (it isn’t served iced in Iceland or in Ireland, womp). I got a coke and a small bag of chips and got back on the bus — we only stopped for 20 minutes, but I was just eager to get to the cliffs.
Once we finally got there, I stopped briefly to go to the restroom and to grab a sandwich to eat once I hiked to the top of the cliffs. While it was a really steep climb, it didn’t seem as much of a hike as climbing back up from Gulfoss in Iceland did. There’s a slate wall separating the “official” path with the private farmland path — the farmland path doesn’t have any sort of barrier between the path itself and the edge of the cliffs, so it’s a bit more dangerous. It has such stunning views, though, so I decided to hop the slate fence. It was really nerve-wracking at first. Snapchat’s altitude filter told me we were almost 556 feet above sea level, and the wind up there was pretty fierce. Once I started to get my bearings, I felt a lot more comfortable venturing closer to the edge. That being said, there were plenty of others both in my own travel group and total strangers that were making me as nervous as all get out with how close they were getting to the edge…most of the time for the sake of a photo. I took a ton of pictures, since I know the cliffs are what my mom wanted to see the most. Once I felt like I had a sufficient number, I sat down on the edge and just took it all in for a while before we had to go back to the bus. I stopped at the gift shop briefly to pick up some postcards that have more stunning photos. All in all, I couldn’t be happier with the cliffs — it was a beautiful, sunny day and the only clouds in the sky were bright white and fluffy. I got some amazing photos and had a few minutes of relaxation, listening to the waves crash against the bottom of the cliffs.
Once we left the cliffs, it was off to our hotel. We’re staying at a single-story, family-owned hotel called the Oak Wood. It’s beautiful, the rooms are clean and spacious and decorated beautifully. I think some of the rooms are different “themes,” so to speak. Nicole and I have a room that is decorated in country chic grey furniture with a gold and white patterned accent wall. The bathroom is amazing with a patterned tile, a massive shower, a big bright mirror, and best of all: a towel warmer rack.
We had just under an hour before we needed to meet back up with the group for our last group dinner, which was at Bunratty Castle. It was a medieval banquet style dinner. I’m not much a fan of reenactment things like that, since it usually seems really forced. We got there and crossed the “draw bridge,” which was not at all a draw bridge, where we were asked if we were friend or foe. Once we gave our tickets and went in, we were taken to the reception room. There were two people dressed in medieval uniforms — one playing the harp, the other playing the violin. We were given mead when we walked in. It’s an alcoholic drink, honey flavored. It’s apparently as strong as whiskey, and I believe it. It didn’t have quite the kick that straight whiskey does, but it warms the insides just the same. We all had one small glass of that before the festivities started. It turns out, Jan, who has been behind coordinating all of our media visits, arranged back in January for Helen and Bob to be the lord and lady of the banquet tonight. Bob was adorably surprised, and couldn’t have been a better fit for the role. They were each given their crowns and there was some singing and storytelling before we headed back downstairs to the dining room.
Once we got there, it was apparent this was about to get real medieval. We were only given a knife, and were told our other utensils were merely our hands. I ended up just stabbing all of my food with my knife and eating it off of that, rather than using my fingers. There was a pureed vegetable soup as an appetizer, which was pretty good and easy enough to drink straight from the bowl. Our second appetizer was barbecue spare ribs — they were good, but pretty fatty, and I’m really particular about my meat (and not the biggest fan of it, at that), so it wasn’t my favorite. The main course was chicken on the bone with carrots, onions and parsnips, plus some roasted potatoes and gravy. It was pretty good, though I’m not a big fan of parsnips or cooked carrots. I ate all of my chicken and plenty of potatoes, though. We got some sort of appley pear custard for dessert that had lots of crumbles on it — it was really, really good. My favorite part about the whole shebang was the bottomless wine, though.
As lord of the banquet, Bob had to try the soup first — if he decided he didn’t like it, a new lord was to be found. Of course, he said it was the best soup he’d ever had. At one point, the head of the banquet decided this Alex fellow had to be punished for fooling with ladies, and it was Bob’s decision what his punishment was — Bob decided he needed to sing a song. The kid was apparently from Missouri, and at first seemed very uncomfortable, but eventually started belting “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” and EVERYONE joined in, so it wasn’t all that bad for him after all. All the actors sang songs at the end — they have really good voices. They led us downstairs for coffee and tea, and we had the option there to buy some of their mead or CDs, which I opted not to do.
We got back on the tour bus and headed back to the hotel. During the ride, we presented our cards to Helen and Bob that we all secretly signed throughout the trip, and we gave one to Joe as well. After that, Joe did a singalong with some traditional Irish songs — he had about three cups of mead before dinner started, and he’s a small fellow. I think he felt it quite a bit, but we all enjoyed singing along with the little Irish man anyways 🙂
Breakfast starts at 7:15 tomorrow morning and then we have to leave for the airport around 8. I think it’s something like a 7 hour flight back to JFK, and then another short flight to Pittsburgh. Instead of the nine hour layover we had at JFK on the way to Iceland, we have just an hour and a half this time, which I’m sure will be stressful by the time we all get through customs in the US — it’s much more intense than it was in Iceland and Ireland. I should be on the ground in Pittsburgh sometime around 6 p.m. and I really couldn’t be more thrilled. I’ve learned a lot this trip, both about international media and myself. I’ve learned that while I love traveling, I don’t think group travels are for me. I wholeheartedly appreciate all the things we got to do and see, and all the people we got to talk to, but it gets really hectic trying to get 20 people in the same place at the same time — not to mention dramatic. I like going off to do my own thing and experience culture as it is, rather than fitting into a tourist destination that is catered to me. My philosophy on travel is that I should try to immerse myself into the world around me, rather than have the world around me establish a destination to make me feel more at home, or to give me some false sense of culture.
That being said, I had lots of great experiences on this trip and it certainly made me want to travel more in the future and come back with my loved ones and show them all the wonders I got to see, and explore all the things we didn’t have time to see. I’m really excited to get home and dine on some American food and sip on my favorite — Schweppes ginger ale.
Signing off for this one!
TRAVEL DAY
Well, it’s off to a rough start already. We all met in the hotel for breakfast, where we learned our flight had been delayed 155 minutes. Our flight doesn’t leave here until 2:30 local time, about 9:30 Pittsburgh time. We aren’t scheduled to land at JFK until 4:30, but our connecting flight back to Pittsburgh is scheduled to leave at 3:25. They said there’s a chance the connecting flight will be delayed, and that the pilot will hold the plane for up to 20 minutes, but it looks like the chances of us making it back to Pittsburgh today are really slim. It would have to be a perfect alignment — we’re going through customs here so we don’t have to in the States, and we would have to make up a lot of time in the air. When we land in JFK, the pilot would have to call the pilot of our connecting flight and ask him to hold for us. The only other hope is that Delta really doesn’t want to eat the money to buy 23 people hotel rooms at JFK and then eat the cost of tomorrow’s flights…
They set up a backup plan for us to stay at JFK tonight, fly to Detroit tomorrow and then arrive back in Pittsburgh around 9:30 p.m. I don’t really understand how that’s the fastest option back, but I’m seriously considering getting myself a megabus ticket from JFK to Pittsburgh if we can’t get our flight home tonight because I do not want to be traveling anymore and I don’t want to be away from home anymore. After the nine hour layover in JFK, I’m sick of spending time in airports — we already went through security so we’re pretty much trapped.
I really hate when I feel like I have no control over my situation, and that’s exactly what this is, so it’s getting under my skin a whole lot. There’s nothing I can do about it, and I know no mood I’m in is going to change anything, but I’m in a really terrible mood about it all and really, the only thing that is going to fix that is getting home today. I don’t care if it’s 3 in the morning, I just do not want to sleep in another hotel and spend more time in an airport.
Hopefully, the next time I update this, I’ll have news that we did indeed make our connecting flight.