Pensieri di Nate: An Irish Thanksgiving Weekend

This weekend we spent 5 days in Ireland for our long Thanksgiving break. Matt and I really enjoyed ourselves, and had a great time. This is a list of a few of the things we did

     1. Learned about Ireland's rough history with England
     2. Learned about how Guinness is made
     3. Drink Guinness just to make sure they made it right
     4. Recognized that they drive on the wrong side of the road
     5. Visited Trinity College
     6. Taste tested Guinness a little bit more
     7. Had an Irish Thanksgiving
     8. Enjoyed Guinness and the way it was made
     9. Spent time with friends
   10. Visited the Cliffs of Moher

If you think that sounds like a lot.. it was. In fact I had planned on writing this yesterday, but Matt and I got home and went straight to sleep!

Thursday morning Matt and I went on a walking tour of Dublin and saw all of the "must see" buildings, monuments, and locations in the city. But while on this tour we got a nice lesson in the complexity of the situation between The Republic of Ireland and England, and mainly why England still controls Northern Ireland (the reason why we didn't visit Belfast). The following photos are some of the cool places we visited:

This is the courtyard of the Castle

Castle Entrance Tower

Trinity College Tower


This was built to hide the slums behind the castle when the Queen of England came to visit

Castle Tower and Church (original)

Christ Church

Ha'Penny Bridge

Besides seeing all of the city, Matt and I went on a tour of the Guinness factor with some of the other USAC guys. I found it very interesting (and fun) to see how Guinness is actually made! The tour was very interactive with things you could read, touch, watch, and TASTE! Dublin was a really cool city and I really enjoyed spending some time there. If you are in Europe I would highly suggest getting to Ireland because the countryside was beautiful, the people were nice, and the beer is good!