Gorgeous Galway

From Dublin, we took a morning bus across the country to Galway. The trip was so great - the countryside of Ireland is definitely one of the best parts of it, in my opinion. After we got settled, we went to a pub named "Paddy's" for lunch and then decided to walk through the square and on to see a few touristy-things as this was going to be our only day actually in the town. (We did another tour outside of the city the second day.)

We started off by walking through the Latin Quarters, which is were all of the shopping and most of the restaurants are. We then continued on to walk to the gorgeous bay.

So serene.

These steps led right to the water. If we would have gone down a few more we may have been sucked into the current! It was SO windy this day, too, that the water was rushing along. (Veronica, Erica, Me, and Mary Kate.)

This is the Spanish Arch - one of four - that were built in 1854.

We walked out onto this little strip of land between two parts of the bay. It was SO cold and windy here, but also incredibly beautiful.

Our Galway hostel was the best way we have stayed yet - we had a 6-person private room so it was just like our own hotel room, but we each had our own bed! We even had a bathroom within our room. We went to a place called Fat Freddy's for pizza/pasta this night and then went out with one of Mary Kate's best friends, Kara, who is studying abroad in Galway. We went to a club and got to experience a little Irish college culture, as it seems the majority of the people who make up the population of Galway are college students. One interesting thing about their club scene is that the clubs hire people to give out stamps in the middle of the streets. If you get a stamp, then you can get into the clubs for free. It is a strange system, but you can bet that we all ran to each person and had at least 5-6 stamps on our hands by the end of the night!

Here is Erica, me, Andrea and Mary Kate out in Galway!