Glasgow/Dublin

We left Glasgow yesterday morning, after a couple of days exploring the city. It was nice to have a look around, but there wasn't anything of great 'tourist' value there, although we did look through the 'Glasgow Necropolis' - which was essentially an old and elaborate cemetary and gardens perched on a hill overlooking the city. It was different, but something interesting to have a look at - as well as providing some good views.






Glasgow









Glasgow Necropolis (and views from..)


Upon waking up and checking out, we quickly caught a train to Stranraer, which is right on the coast of Scotland, in order to catch a ferry to Ireland. I had visions of a small ferry, with maybe some sort of open deck, but this thing was huge. Owned & operated by a company called Stena Line that I had previously (and in retrospect arguably ignorantly) never even knew existed - the ferry was part of the worlds biggest/best ferries, and inside was reminiscent of a shopping centre/restaurant/cruise ship. In short, the ferry was nice inside, and a pleasant way for us to spend the two hours between Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Upon arrival at Northern Ireland, we were greeted by an empty carpark - and were informed by a bus driver that there was no such busses between the port and Belfast Central - a fact later confirmed by the administration at the port. The same administration who advised us that the earlier bus driver was driving the bus that was meant to take us to Belfast Central - and had somehow left/failed to tell us that HIS bus would take us there... Slightly annoyed, we caught a taxi to Belfast Central, which only ended up being about £9, so between the four of us it worked out alright. We also got some sort of amusement out of The Corrs being the first song we heard on Irish radio.

Once at Belfast Central, we were quickly onto getting a ticket through to Dublin, as with the delays caused by a lack of bus - we had only 15 minutes to buy tickets and get onto the train. This ended up being no hassle whatsoever, and we disembarked from Belfast and Northern Ireland, and headed south. After seeing the stock-standard (for here, at least) rolling hills, valleys and lucious green fields, we arrived into Dublin at about 8:15pm last night, with a suprising spring in our step, despite the lengthy amount of travel we had endured throughout the day.

We're currently in the extremely attractive and pleasant city of Dublin. Upon arrival here and walking through the major shopping precints, such as Temple Bar and O'Connell Street, all of us agreed that Dublin is one of the better (if not the best) looking cities we've been to. At night time the city is still 'bustling', and the vibe around the place is incredibly pleasant - even as it gets on through the night. Talented buskers are a plenty, as are people engaged in a variety of sociable activities, entering in and out of the cities many charming pubs, sharing a good time with friends and the like.





Dublin

The city itself is divided by the Liffey River, and with everything lit up throughout the night, it really is a sight to behold as it is incredibly 'pretty' and all works together nicely.



Liffey River


The room we have here is incredibly basic, it's essentially bunk beds and... a small bathroom. Nothing else whatsoever, but all we really need is somewhere to shower and sleep, so there's not much to complain about - although everything here is incredibly expensive. I'm not sure if it's just the exchange rate between the Euro and the Australian dollar, or Dublin in general, but everything is at least 25% more expensive here than LONDON, and considerably moreso than Scotland (which was the cheapest of the places we have been to so far).

Anyway, after we checked into our room, we made our way around Dublin, which as I said earlier is an incredibly attractive city - and accidentally, but luckily, walked ourselves right in the middle of the Temple Bar district - which is just an exciting and interesting few streets full of buskers, restaurants and pubs and clubs. There isn't many landmarks here persay, we've just been walking around taking in the atmophere of the city, as well as looking at a few places, such as Trinity College (this really old, fancy college) and Dublin Castle.



Trinity College



Dublin Castle


We have another couple of days here, and then we're planning to head south through Kilkenny and/or Cork, and then back to the UK before our tour.

Also off to the Guiness Brewery tomorrow hopefully... and Im sure you're all wonderfully jealous.

Hope everything is fine back home,

Mark