emerald isle and pudding

until something more interesting happens in my life other than being unbelievably broke, i will post lovely photos of the best year o' my life, my modern Grand Tour, mon annee europeenne. le sigh.

part one: ireland.

my best friend from the PRE-SCHOOL years (that is a LONG friendship, people) and i went to visit ireland together. at the time, she was studying in geneva for a year, and i was in grenoble (a sweet french mountain town nestled into the alps). In june, we hightailed it to the land of 1/4 of my ancestors for a week traveling from dublin to cork to killarney to dingle and back.

The above photo is of the westernmost bike ride possible in europe. Dingle is the westernmost town in Europe, and we took a train and a six-hour bus ride to get there. It's a charming little town with small streets bursting with pubs. Although I was pretty nauseous from the six hours of winding hilly roads in a bus, we left our oversized backpacks with some kind people in the storage room of their mini-grocery store and rented bikes and made our way down the western path of europe. We road past remote villages, cottages tucked behind gardens and immense yards, beyond fields dotted with cows who moo'ed as we whizzed by, the salty sea air blowing through our blonde ponytails.

Below: the town of Dingle. Look at the winding, hilly view! I'm practically salivating at the memory of such beautiful landscape. I'm currently applying to graduate schools in Ireland, and this makes me lust all the more for an acceptance.

and, what is possibly the most thrilling entertainment to be found in Ireland: BREAD PUDDING. Although not as easy to find as you may think. My friend and I wandered in and out of about 4 pubs/restaurants in Dublin's Temple district before we found one that had bread pudding on the menu. (I was on a mission. Yes, I am that obsessive about food.) Luckily I have a friend that puts up with it. And boy, oh boy. Was that caramel-glazed-with-vanilla-ice-cream bread pudding DELICIOUS.