ireland day 4
early saturday morning katz and i woke up with plans to drive to dublin. we were finally taking the trip into our own hands and the idea of a mini road trip vacation during our vacation was quite exciting. we had a big breakfast and tea before we left and then got down to it. the trip was roughly 130 miles so it was supposed to take a little over 2 hours. we had made a couple of mix cd's the night before for the drive and we got off to a good start. we were seeing some irish countryside, jamming to weezer's "this is such a pity" and then BOOM! i had misjudged the amount of room from the curb on the left side of the car and ran over a median at 60mph.
luckily all that resulted was a flat tire and i got to work putting on the spare. i jacked up the car, took the flat tire off and then realized that i would need to jack it up higher to get the spare on. the problem was that as you can see, we were on grass and every time you spun the jack it dug deeper into the ground rather than propping the car up. so i had to take it out. only it got stuck. and in a moment of brilliant inspiration, i decided to move the car ever so slightly till it came loose. so i did, and the jack came loose, but the bare axel for the wheel dug itself into the ground instead. we tried to jack the car up again but for various reasons it didn't work. so we went door to door for help. this is ireland farm country mind you. after two nobody home attempts we came across a strapping young irish lad that said he could help. we got in his truck and drove back to the car where he pulled out some enormous state of the art jack and had the new tire on in 3 minutes flat. it was very impressive.
back on the road. made it to dublin in a little over 3 hours and parked in a lot and took the train into town. our first stop was the guinness factory. disappointingly, it is not the actual factory anymore, more like a museum (the main factory is now in belfast). aaron and i were expecting huge vats of guinness with a guy stirring it with an enormous spoon. no dice. we did become honororay apprentices to the master brewer and have the id cards to prove it. at the end of the tour you get a complimentary pint of guinness on the top floor with a skybox view of dublin. very nice.
then we walked around dublin trying to get a feel for the city. we were told that temple bar was the place to be so we went there. lot's of bars to be sure. in fact, all ireland is basically is farm land and bars. ask anyone what to do and they will tell you to go to the bar. it was a bit too early to start drinking so we walked around some more. we found a really nice park that must be dublin's equivalent to central park and took some pictures there. mostly we walked around and talked.
so then we checked into our hostel. it was a saturday night so beds were scarce and we finally found a hostel with an opening. it was in a room with 8 other people but we didn't care. in fact, that sounded even better. we immediately met two americans from atlanta. a 22 year old girl named megan and a 19 year old guy named nick. megan was starting a semester in london and was doing a little trip around europe before classes started and nick was her possibly gay friend along for the ride. they asked us if we wanted to go to temple bar with them and we figured why not? we were going there anyway to drink. however, we realized very quickly that nick and megan were pretty lame. in fact, after two drinks katz decided to ditch them. and how's this for a brilliant scheme. first he says he's tired and wants to head back and then when they say they are going to head back to, he switches his story to "we are gonna walk around some more". unless they are idiots, they knew what was what.
we wound up not doing anything special with the rest of the night anyway. we walked around, went to an internet cafe to check box office (which ruined katz's evening) and then went back to the hostel. there were two dudes from the czech republic there already asleep and these guys snored like sons of bitches. the most exaggerated, cartoony snoring you can think of, only louder. and that was day 4.
luckily all that resulted was a flat tire and i got to work putting on the spare. i jacked up the car, took the flat tire off and then realized that i would need to jack it up higher to get the spare on. the problem was that as you can see, we were on grass and every time you spun the jack it dug deeper into the ground rather than propping the car up. so i had to take it out. only it got stuck. and in a moment of brilliant inspiration, i decided to move the car ever so slightly till it came loose. so i did, and the jack came loose, but the bare axel for the wheel dug itself into the ground instead. we tried to jack the car up again but for various reasons it didn't work. so we went door to door for help. this is ireland farm country mind you. after two nobody home attempts we came across a strapping young irish lad that said he could help. we got in his truck and drove back to the car where he pulled out some enormous state of the art jack and had the new tire on in 3 minutes flat. it was very impressive.
back on the road. made it to dublin in a little over 3 hours and parked in a lot and took the train into town. our first stop was the guinness factory. disappointingly, it is not the actual factory anymore, more like a museum (the main factory is now in belfast). aaron and i were expecting huge vats of guinness with a guy stirring it with an enormous spoon. no dice. we did become honororay apprentices to the master brewer and have the id cards to prove it. at the end of the tour you get a complimentary pint of guinness on the top floor with a skybox view of dublin. very nice.
then we walked around dublin trying to get a feel for the city. we were told that temple bar was the place to be so we went there. lot's of bars to be sure. in fact, all ireland is basically is farm land and bars. ask anyone what to do and they will tell you to go to the bar. it was a bit too early to start drinking so we walked around some more. we found a really nice park that must be dublin's equivalent to central park and took some pictures there. mostly we walked around and talked.
so then we checked into our hostel. it was a saturday night so beds were scarce and we finally found a hostel with an opening. it was in a room with 8 other people but we didn't care. in fact, that sounded even better. we immediately met two americans from atlanta. a 22 year old girl named megan and a 19 year old guy named nick. megan was starting a semester in london and was doing a little trip around europe before classes started and nick was her possibly gay friend along for the ride. they asked us if we wanted to go to temple bar with them and we figured why not? we were going there anyway to drink. however, we realized very quickly that nick and megan were pretty lame. in fact, after two drinks katz decided to ditch them. and how's this for a brilliant scheme. first he says he's tired and wants to head back and then when they say they are going to head back to, he switches his story to "we are gonna walk around some more". unless they are idiots, they knew what was what.
we wound up not doing anything special with the rest of the night anyway. we walked around, went to an internet cafe to check box office (which ruined katz's evening) and then went back to the hostel. there were two dudes from the czech republic there already asleep and these guys snored like sons of bitches. the most exaggerated, cartoony snoring you can think of, only louder. and that was day 4.
posted by Chad Hartigan at 4:34 PM
1 Comments:
Do you think on Megan and nick's blog they described you guys as Chad, 22, a scrawny guy who works in the movies and his possibly gay friend Aaron?
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