Kilkee Cliffs (quite windy but not too cold) & Cliffs of Moher (extremely windy and quite cold); we spent a lot of time at the underrated Kilkee Cliffs and then were lucky enough to get the handicap buggy to the top of the Cliffs of Moher. In between we stopped at Loophead Lighthouse, Doonagore Castle, and drove through Doolin.
Drove up north of Galway. Saw Kylemoor Abbey, Connemara National Park, and Killary Fjord.
Took a stroll to the Ha’penny pedestrian bridge to see a bit of Dublin without the rain, then took a quick train ride to Dundalk. Today was mostly meandering around, walked around Ice House Hill Park (where I took my obligatory European duck pictures – though not the best cuz all the kids were trying to pet them), and ended the night as the “Comfortably Dumb” trivia team and actually not doing terribly!
We took a couple different routes on the Hop-Off-Hop-Off buses so I feel like we really got to see a lot of the city. That includes Marienplatz, St. Michael’s church, the eternal flame monument for those lost in WWII, Nymphenburg Palace, Olympic Park where we went to the top of the tower, a market where we saw a maypole, Odeonsplatz, and the English Gardens. The gardens were beautiful, and we stumbled across a place where apparently a lot of people go to surf the little waves coming out from under the bridge.
We visited the Shoes on the Danube, a memorial there to honor those lost in WWII. We also went through the Labyrinth, naturally made, but now used in connection to Dracula; they were quite creepy with very few lights, fog, and opera music echoing throughout accompanied by wax figures as a masquerade ball. We took the funicular down Buda Hill, rode the Budapest Eye, and as we were sitting having a milkshake to cool down, a random parade came by as there are multiple festivals happening around here, but what mostly caught my attention was the guy having to wear a fur coat in 90 degrees. We had a great dinner where we cooked our own meat on a lava rock (I had some Mangalica Pork, mostly because I was really intrigued by the concept of eating a fuzzy pig). And then we were supposed to take an overnight train tonight to Munich, but we ended up missing that one, but we were able to get another train to Munich tomorrow morning and a hotel room in the same hotel we stayed in last night so it all worked out. Plus we were glad to be able to take a shower after sweating all day.
The cruise is over but we are still hanging around Europe for a little while, so we checked into our hotel where we got a very fancy room for just one night. We explored the city a little more and visited the oldest church in Budapest, the Roman ruins of which can be seen through glass in the floor of the new church built over it. We took a tour of Margaret Island on some electric scooters – the traffic was crazy but it was quite a fun way to get around. Margaret Island is located in between Buda and Pest (on one side of the Danube is Buda and the other is Pest – the two cities joined a while ago, first being called Pestbuda, but since Buda was the previous capital they decided to put that first). The island is so beautiful, basically just a giant park as there are no residences and no cars are allowed to drive around, and it contains an English rose garden, a Japanese garden, a zoo, and a waterpark, as well as a fountain that does a light show in the evening and lots of green space.
We visited the Rock Hospital which was not what I had expected but was extremely interesting. They didn’t allow us to take photos inside, but they had wax statues all through the tunnels in the cave to represent how it was used in WWII as a hospital and later as a potential nuclear shelter for the threat during the Cold War. We went to Gellert Hill and visited the church built into the stone, and then I hiked up to the top and the views were spectacular (you can see a more detailed story of that adventure by searching “Hiking Gellert Hill”). We also walked through a local market (located in a very large, grand looking building) and got some fresh fruit. And finally, as it is the last night of the cruise, they led us into town to the street filled with all the nightlife and bars and we hung out with some of the friends we have made.
Had first French croissant today and it was very good. We went up to Montre-Marte and saw the Sacre-Couer catedral and explored the little village there with cute art; the catedral was cool because on the outside of the windows are gray, but on the inside they were colorful stain glass. Then I had a crepe with strawberry jam on it and we had a sandwich on a baguette. I learned some French phrases like “Can I please have some water” and “Where are the toilets” and I think I’ve gotten my French accent down pretty good; but also last night I asked our waiter where the toilets were in French and he just laughed and pointed while saying (in English) “Downstairs.”
Next we went to Notre Dam which was also gorgeous. I tried my first macaroon and it was so good. At the waiting spot, there was a whole flock of pigeons and Nick and Kat actually got some to land on them! Then we went on a river boat cruise on the Seine and saw the Eiffel Tower.
It doesn’t feel like we’re in London yet or that we’ve been traveling for almost 30 hours. We were able to board the bus right after we got off the flight and traveled to Windsor Castle. Coincidently, the Queen was also there at that time (as we could tell from the flag flying), and a couple people from our group actually saw her driving away in her car! We went down to the River Thames and hung out with the geese and swans there, and then after a while of trying to figure out how to get there, we went around to some gates where you could see the castle, the huge road leading up to it, and the guards in the distance. After dinner we walked to and around Kensington Park and saw the palace and pretty views.
We got to go to a black sand beach (Punaluu), where I attempted to walk barefoot, but that only lasted about 30 seconds. We went to a volcanic crater and while we waited for the sunset we hiked through some caves nearby.
We watched the sunset at the crater and after dark you could see the lava glowing and it would come up the sides, which is apparently pretty rare!
