"Do not marry an Irish man," and other advice...

After our stressful day in Glasgow both Amelia and I were keen to sleep in a little the next morning before heading off to Enniskerry.  We decided to spend a little time in Dublin (Amelia had a certain shop she wanted to visit) and then catch the bus to Enniskerry.  We made it downstairs from our room to find that our host had prepared breakfast for us.  Always keen for free food we sat down to eat and started to chat with our host.  She was really wonderful giving us tips of what to see in Dublin and so forth.  After giving us directions she sent us off with this little advice: "Don't get involved with an Irish man, they are terribly unreliable." So with that odd little tidbit we headed off into Dublin city.  The next thing we learned about Ireland is that Irish bus drivers are unbelievably nice.  We were attempting to catch a train into the city but we didn't have the exact change that the bus needed.  The bus driver took what we had and told us to get on.  With relief we lugged our bags onto the bus and headed into Dublin. From Dublin we again got into a bind where the bus to Enniskerry, one that only came once per hour, didn't accept notes, only coins.  But again they let us on with the promise that we could change a note at the other end.  Extremely good experience with the Irish, not sure what our host was talking about.

Once we got to Enniskerry we called a cab to take us to the hostel.  In the meantime we went and had customary ice creams from the local sweet shop.  With ice-cream in hand we headed up to the hostel to be met with this view:

 From our hostel balcony

We were so fortunate to have no one else in our dorm making it like a private room! After we dropped our bags off we went exploring.  We walked down the through Irish lanes and found a creek that we may have stayed at for a good portion of time, and found a wood full of beautiful trees. 

Irish countryside is beautiful! After deciding that we needed to walk back to get some dinner we then proceeded to make a sheet and pillow fort on the bottom bunk in order to watch some Harry Potter. The next day we decided we wanted to find a waterfall called Powerscourt Waterfall that we had seen on some map somewhere.  So we headed off to find this waterfall.  An hour and half later of walking we come to an entrance to the waterfall, for a 5.50 euro fee.  We decided that we had seen a lot of beautiful waterfalls and decided to move on without seeing the waterfall.  Seeing a sign for Enniskerry that said we were 3km away we decided to head towards there.  

We stopped for lunch with this view

We powered on and on.  It seemed as though no matter how much we walked the signs still said 3km away.  Just as we were getting tired and our feet were aching we saw a sign for Powerscourt house and gardens.  The previous day we had been told that the only place to get cash out was at Powerscourt gardens and so we decided to go and take advantage of this fact while we were there. So down we walked to the beautiful house and gardens of Powerscourt. Unfortunately both the ATM wasn't working and I had forgotten to bring my card.  Fortunately, the view was beautiful and the boulevard we walked down towards this magnificent house was also stunning so we weren't complaining too much.  We also met a horse, and that makes a lot of things better.  After finishing up at the house we decided to walk into Enniskerry and then walk back to our hostel.  

The walk to Powerscourt house

We stopped in at a little shop to ask for directions back to our hostel and the gentleman there said; "Well you've got a beautiful sunny day today and it shouldn't take you much longer than an hour."  He was right about one thing; it didn't take us much longer than an hour.  He was dead wrong about the weather.  However walking in the rain along Irish roads isn't all that bad at all.  I taught Amelia the word 'earnest' when I described the rain coming down in earnest and we met some horses.  So in all we walked for about 6 hours but it well worth it to see God's marvelous creation.
  

Our Irish gentlehorse...

We arrived back at the hostel pretty wet and fairly hungry (or at least I was) so we headed back up to our room where we found that we had room mates in a fairly abrupt way.  There was a woman brazenly moisturizing her legs, with no trousers on. How we manage to find these people is beyond me but find her we did.  This woman (who Amelia nicknamed Nellie No-pants) proceeded for a large majority of the evening with no trousers on so Amelia and I made a quick escape out to the common room.  After making dinner and uploading photos and writing blog posts we then headed to bed. 

The next day was to be our last in Ireland however we didn't need to be at the airport until around 5:30, so we headed back into Dublin where we dropped our bags off at a internet cafe and purchased a ticket for a hop on, hop off train that did a small tour around Dublin with plenty of Irish music to numb our brains.  We then found an Irish pub so that Amelia could try some true Irish Guinness. The half pint remained half full upon the arrival of dinner.  I wouldn't want to try Guinness after Amelia's response to it.  With plenty of time to spare we traveled to the airport and caught the plane to: 

Beauvais

But they are other stories for another time. 

Goodnight friends!