The entire goal for me during my time here was to see and experience different cultures and see what other countries had for natural landmarks. The experience to travel around in Ireland is amazing because the landscape is so beautiful. I was able to take two trips so far. One trip to the Aran Islands and the second to Dublin, the capital city in Ireland.
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| Ocean View, Aran Islands |
While on the Aran Islands, we had the opportunity to see how isolated the islands would have been up until recently to the main land Ireland. The islands are extremely beautiful and there is a constant view of the ocean no matter where you go on the islands. The Aran Islands consist of three separate islands, one big island and two smaller islands. While on Inishmore, the largest of the islands, we toured Dun Aengus and some of the surrounding cliffs. Dun Aengus is a barbarian fort located on the island, which would have been used for many different things. This site held an enormous amount of history and allowed an insight to how life was different in the early 1100 b.c. era. The fort is located along a cliff line to help with defenses and the cliffs are a sheer drop. Just getting close to an edge like that makes you shake just a little, because nobody really wants to fall. Another great point that adds to the islands majestic features is the sound and color of the ocean. But my time here was short so I was not able to see every thing and would like to return to spend some more time site seeing around the island.
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| Clonmacnoise |
During my trip to Dublin, we had many stops along the way. One was to a monastic settlement, a jail, and then the city itself. There are many different monastic settlements though out Ireland and they all have an importance with the development of Ireland. The monastic settlement that we stopped at was Clonmacnoise. This would have been the main monastic settlement, because it was located right in the middle of Ireland. The site was absolutely gorgeous to see with all of the stone buildings mostly intact after so long. After this stop we went to Kilmainham Gaol (and yes that how you say it, gaol = jail in Gaelic) and this was an active jail until about 100 years ago. This jail also had an overwhelming amount of history attached to it through out the years. It was originally the first of its kind and had many design problems. This were addressed in latter designs. It has housed many prisoners and quite famous one, for example the leaders of the Easter Uprising which brought Ireland is freedom from England. While I was in the city I had a great time exploring the layout of the city itself. The city of Dublin feels as small as Grand Island or Kearney but has the actual size of Omaha or Lincoln. This blew my mind that such a big city could feel so small.
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| Trinity College |
While roaming around the city I went to Trinity College and saw the book of Kells. The college is amazing with its architecture. The book of Kells is located in an enormous library. The book itself allows us to make connections between fact and fiction that is in Irish lore. Another amazing thing that I was able to experience was Irish Whiskey and the history of Irish Whiskey. The hardship that people making Irish Whiskey is amazing and not well known. Do not worry I am not going to give you the entire history it would take to long sorry. While learning about Irish Whiskey it is only natural to taste some Irish Whiskey, so that is what I did next. I went to an Irish Whiskey brewery to taste some Irish Whiskey. The brewery that I went to is the only one that is an active brewery in the last 40 years in Dublin. All the other breweries move to different parts of Ireland as a consolidation process and it was cheaper at the time to brew in certain places in Ireland. After have Whiskey for the first time ever it creates a warming affect, which feels really amazing and quite different. The only thing that I do not like about drinking it is the burning sensation on my throat. After my Whiskey tasting my time in Dublin was up and I had to return back to Spiddal but on our return we stopped at Trim Castle.
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| Trim Castle |
Many know of the movie Braveheart, well this was the castle that part of it was filmed. The Castle itself is quite astonishing today. There is a great misconception that movies have made about castles and that is most of them were white. Crazy right a gigantic, white building in the middle of green terrain. This was a shock to hear and I can not imagine a castle like that to be white.
And thus my trip to Aran Islands and Dublin had to come to an end.
More pictures attached below.
More Travel Experiences to Come
Kyle Halsted
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| Whiskey Tasting at a Dublin Brewery |
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Whiskey Tasting From Whiskey Museum
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