Long weekend and another short week

Hey there,

so first I want to apologize for not updating at all last week but I was quite busy and also didn't watch all through my pictures, so I didn't know which pictures I wanted to upload. But here it is. So this post will be about the weekend of the 12th of May and the following week until Friday. For the last weekend there will be an extra post tomorrow.

So here is the route my boyfriend and me took. All in all I drove about 1000 to 1100 km:

made with https://www.falk.de/routenplaner

So first thing on Friday morning was taking the bus down to Shannon Airport. Since I'm not 25 the only wayto rent a car was to get it at an airport and since we didn't want to pay the one-way-rental-fee I had to get the car down at Shannon airport. I rented the car through the easirent.com website. On arrival at the airport I called the branch in Shannon and was picked up by Jordan who works for Easirent. We booked an Fiat 500 online but got an upgrade free of charge to a Ford Fiesta.

our Ford Fiesta

So after getting the car I made my journey up to Dublin airport where I met Michael after parking the car in one of the parks there. We then took the bus into the city and I put my suitcase into a luggage storage. Since it was raining a little bit we decided to go to the Long Room of the Trinity College Library first. Also as part of going there we went through the Books of Kells exhibition which was quite fascinating considering that it was written at some point of the 9th century. Up in the Long Room one can see a model of the Irish Harp as well:

Long Room of the Old Library at Trinity College Dublin

Irish Harp 

After finishing there we thought about going to the Teeling Distillery. Unfortunately there weren't any open spaces for the remaining tours that day so we decided to walk to Jameson Distillery in Bow Street and see if we got into a tour there. On arrival we learned that we would be able to join a tour but it would have taken a bit longer than we wanted keeping in mind that we wanted to check into our AirBnB on time. So we decided to come back there on Saturday morning and instead went around town with me steering us to the National Leprechaun Museum. It is a tiny museum and it is all about the mystic creatures in Irish folklore. We went in there and learned about giants, fairies and leprechauns and their origins.

Michael and me in the giants room

inside the show

So after this we went to get my suitcase and after that to our AirBnB which was located with in the Temple Bar district. After checking in we went out to Nandos to get dinner and than made plans for the next day before having a bit a of an earlier night because we were both up since early in the morning.

On Saturday we first went to Jameson Distillery  and got into the 11:15 tour. It was very interesting but I liked the tour back in 2014 better because now it is an all media sourced and one doesn't see anything of the actual distillery anymore. But it was still interesting. Afterwards we went to the food court of a shopping centre for lunch before taking a bus out to the airport at about half one (13:30) and starting our journey to Belfast. In Belfast Michael wanted to see the Murals which are graffiti. So we took a taxi tour through it and the driver told us all about the history of the risings and the IRA. Also he told us how there was a period of peace before the troubles started up again. Also he told us about the hunger strikes and how John F. Kennedy was the first person ever to write something on the peace wall. Now thousands and thousands of people have followed him and we did as well:

one of the murals

my writing on the wall

We finished the tour at around 18:45 and than after getting some petrol and sandwiches at a petrol station we began our journey to Ballymoney. After taking a wrong exit we had to drive through some back roads before we arrived and had a late dinner while talking to our host, Alan, about Northern Ireland and our plans for the next day. 

On Sunday we wanted to visit the Dark Hedges and the Giants Causeway. So our first stop were the Dark Hedges. This is a tree-lined road were a scene of the Game of Thrones was shot. So here is a picture of it:

the Dark Hedges

After that we made our way along the coastal road down to the Giants Causeway. On the way there we met a lot of cyclists who almost had me going mad because of how many there were and the missing opportunities to overtake them. At the causeway we had a small lunch and then went down to these basalt stones that are building the Giants Causeway ever since 50 to 60 million years ago. But according to an Irish legend the causeway was built by a giant of the name Finn MacCool, who was challenged to a fight by Scottish giant Brenandonner,  in order to meet the Scottish giant. To go down the hill and see this fantastic sight was truly breathtaking and also made me feel quite small thinking about it all.

middle causeway

grand causeway

small and middle causeway

After that we drove down the coastal road a bit more to go down to Galway again. I wanted to make a stop in Londonderry at first but it was quite late so we didn't do that and only stopped in Ballyshannon to get some food before going straight back onto the road again. We arrived quite late in Galway and since I drove the whole time I was a bit knackered so I opted to go straight to bed after some light dinner and a quick talk about Monday. Also on this day we reached the peak number of roundabouts per day of the trip counting 23 at the end of the day. My level of confidence with them changed from 'Oh my god! I don't get these Irish roundabouts!' to 'Come on! He's taking the exit, you can go in!' within these 23. So it's save to say I'm now a roundabout pro.

On Monday I had the day off since we wanted to go down to the Cliffs of Moher before returning the car to Shannon Airport. So we got into the car and started our trip. The road was very curvy and also held some serpentines. Also I questioned once more why the Irish have signs up that allow you to go 100 km/h when you can barley drive 60 km/h without risking an accident. On arrival we paid our entry and parking fee and first went to O'Briens tower on the left side coming from the visitor centre. Also we listened to the free audio guide which is available after downloading an app to ones phone. Thereby I learned that the cave they shot Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince in is located right in the cliffs. Also I had a good view of the Aran Islands:

view of the cliffs taken on the way to O'Briens tower

beach next to O'Briens tower

Aran Islands

After that we went to the other side and enjoyed some more good views

O'Briens tower

Cliffs of Moher

We spend quite some time just sitting there and enjoying the sun before we went back to our car and started the drive back to Shannon to bring back our car. Again Michael made me take some back roads because according to him Google said so. Well, on one of these back roads the passenger side of our car suffered a little bit from some of the bushes there. Fortunately for us I took the full cover insurance so we didn't have to worry about it. Back in Shannon we met Frank another employee of Easirent who looked he car over and then took us to the Airport where our bus would leave. He is very nice and also told us that Shannon Airport was used as a emergency landing field for the American Space Shuttles. Which is quite impressive taking into account that Shannon isn't a big airport at all even though it is an international airport. We then took the bus from the airport back to Galway and had a nice dinner. 

On Tuesday I was back at work while Michael roomed the city and took in the sights of Galway even though the weather had changed and it drizzled down. I did my normal stuff of serving customers and helping John out in every way possible.  Also John let me off of work earlier than usual since he knew that Michael was still there. We then proceeded to cook dinner and before he went on to pack his bags.

On Wednesday Michael and I said our goodbyes and I worked the whole day doing what I do best by now: serving customers and giving them first ideas of what we will do with their phones. Also I learned how to change batteries and John showed me how they do the till every day.

On Thursday I tested some phones, served customers, finished some phones off so that they can go into sale and went about my business while helping in every way possible. But the biggest achievement of the day was when I found a way to get the information off of a Samsung that wasn't recognized by the computer. After that now I'm also in charge for that kind of stuff and I stayed a bit longer to help another customer with his phone. This customer bought a Samsung Galaxy S7 from us and wanted to transfer his data from his old S6 onto the new one. Only problem was that Smart Switch didn't work because it was to much data. Also the phone wasn't recognized by the computer iBroke has and with the iMac we had the same problem with Smart Switch as before. So I tried it on my PC and it worked. So we new that if we could get the pictures off the phone in any other way, the smart switch would work. So we wanted to just cut and paste the pictures from the phone onto an SD card. But all the folders appeared to be empty on the computer. So we had no other choice but to delete some apps and download another that I had discovered earlier that allows you to get access to your phone from your computer without a physical connection. So thats how I did it then. And let me tell you downloading 11GB of pictures takes a while. After that I went home and just enjoyed my evening.

On that note I want to end this post. the next post will be up tomorrow (probably also late in the evening)  and it will be about my weekend trip with three of my colleagues who are currently located in Dublin.

So I will see you then and stay tuned. Cheers!

Juliane

P.S.: I actually got used to driving on the other side of the road fairly quickly and now I'm not sure how easy it will be to go back. But in the end of the day the driver sits on middle-of-the-street-side. So really there isn't too much difference.

Inis Oírr, Bank Holiday and short week

Hey there,

how are you all doing? I really should write more often but I just kinda forget about it sometimes and when I think of it I don't have the time. But here I am again. So what happened this last week?

On Friday I got my tickets for the bus and the ferry to Inis Oírr (Inisheer), another island of the Aran Islands, before I went to work. At work I pretty much do the same stuff every day. I serve customers, help  with software problems on phones and also I got to call everyone who had a phone in the "done"-box that got there within the last two weeks. It was actually quite nice to do and I got to practise my English some more, especially regarding the understanding a thick Irish accent department got some boost there. Also the software part makes me kinda grateful that my phone is totally fine, on and running. Up until today I saw a lot of people loosing some data because there phones were disabled. Also there are some iPhones that are just stuck in restore mode and telling people that their phone is basically never gonna work again isn't the happiest thing to do. But back to the my Friday. After work I got some groceries and just enjoyed my evening.

seawater lake at Inis Oírr

On Saturday I got up around the same time as when I work because I booked a tour to Inis Oírr with the same company I booked the trip to Inis Mór. And let me tell you just because this island is smaller in size (only about 3 km on 3 km) it isn't smaller regarding anything else (except probably population). The ferry took about an hour to get to Inis Oírr with a stop at Inis Meáin. When I got of the ferry I already saw a few horse and trap rides and I wanted to take one. Since I was alone I shared mine with a couple from Limerick. First we were told about the school on Inis Oírr. It is complete run by solar and wind energy and hosts first grade until the children are leaving for college.

Plassey

The next stop was at the shipwreck of the Plassey. The ship ran onto the riff near the island in 1960 during a storm and was stranded on Inis Oírr ever since. But it doesn't just sit there. Whenever a big storm is going on the wreck moves a little bit. In the last storm in actually bend and in some places broke in two parts. But what makes the scenery at the Plassey even more special are the Cliffs of Moher. It almost seems like you could just reach out and touch them.

at Inis Oírr

After that the tour went on and we also got to learn about the seawater lake on the island which was connected to the sea during the last storm. The last stop on the ride was an old church which now seems to be built into a hill but was built on then ground level.
After the tour had ended I went up a hill and got lunch at one of the bed and breakfasts on the Island. Since I wanted to get some fresh fish I decided on crab claws. Probably won't ever eat them again ever. But it was really good to try them.


After that I just wandered around the island a bit more and also got some ice cream and some fudge. And let me tell you, I really need to get some fudge before I go back home. I love it. It is amazing.

Plassey and the Cliffs of Moher

beach at Inis Oírr

On Sunday I did my laundry and just relaxed so there isn't really anything to tell you.

view of Galway Bay on Monday

Monday was a bank holyday and I met with Sabine, the trainer at German Bundestag, and her husband. Since they wanted to go to Oslo, the origin of Galway Bay Brewery, we met there. The pub is in Salthill, which is part of Galway but out of the city centre. We met for lunch and just talked about Ireland , Germany and anything and everything in between and above. Also Sabine asked me if I'm coming back. And yes I will come back but I already know that I will miss it here. I already met some amazing people (and hope to continue to do so) and I already made such great memories and there is so much more to see and to visit here. But I will be back in June, no panic. After lunch we walked at the shoreline and through the Latin Quarter back to the city centre and  had a tea before they boarded their coach back to Dublin.  I skyped my parents that evening and went to bed afterwards.

On Tuesday it was back to work and I did what I normally do at work: serve customers, talk to them and help John in every way I can. Also John had to close up the shop in the afternoon for a short time because he had to get his younger daughter from school. Also on Tuesday I finally booked two cars. Yes that's right. I found a company and I booked cars and it actually will work out. I'm still kind of buzzing about it even though it was again coupled with a lot of frustration. But I got cars and that's what's important.

On Wednesday I talked to John about probably leaving work a bit earlier for I had to go to the post office which closes at the same time as iBroke. Work-wise it was pretty much the same as always so no surprises there. But as I was talking to John about a phone I was handling we both realised that I obviously really accommodated myself here because I start swearing. Kind of a lot in comparison to before and even more compared to how much I swear in German.  Since John had to get his daughter again he asked me if I were okay with staying longer and running to the post office in the morning also giving his permission to me coming in later than normal because of it. Of course I said yes and so I stayed even longer than normal to get everything done. He asked me to print every invoice regarding a selling of a phone since January which took me a while. In the evening I wrote some postcards and started packing for my weekend.

Today was a slower day at work so I had time to check every booking for the weekend and make sure everything was good. Other than that I was in charge of working out why an iPhone couldn't be answered when locked. First I updated the software which didn't help and a restore didn't help either. So I started goggling the problem and found put that the same thing happened to a reasonable amount of other users on different iOS versions and that apple actually says to push the home button when answering a locked phone that quite surprised me. However that didn't fix the problem completely. Unfortunately I couldn't find anything else promising so I had to explain it to the customer which went better than expected.

Tomorrow and Monday I got the day off. My boyfriend is coming to visit and we've planned a bit of a road trip. So next time I'm gonna tell you all about that but now it's time for bed.

See you soon. Stay tuned. Cheers!

Juliane

P.S.: If any of you wonder about the slide shows in last weeks blog or why there aren't any in this one: I don't quite know the reason but they're not working. And I don't want you missing out on the pictures so that's why they're posted individually.

Connemara and Inis Mór

Hey there,

as I promised in the last post I'll do one for the last weekend.Like the title says I went on a daytrip to Connemara and on another one to the biggest ofthe Aran Islands, Inis Mór or Inishmore in English.
And let me tell you one thing: It was unbelievably beautiful. I'm out of words about how beautiful. I was just standing there a lot in astonishment and couldn't believe which kind of beauty I was witnessing. But let's start on Saturday morning and prepare yourself for reading the words 'beautiful' and 'stunning' a lot, so hereby you've been warned.

After waking up about the same time as during the week I got myself ready and on my way to the coach station I stopped at Dunnes to get a sandwich to pack since I ran out of bread. I arrived at the coach station with plenty time left until I had to board the coach so I just sat back and waited. On boarding I already noticed that a lot of French people were on the same bus.

landscape at first stop

The first stop was at the beginning of Maam Valley. It was really beautiful.  And I was already blow away. And the day would continue on to blow me away.
Next stop was in Leenane Village. A very small town. But back in 1990 the film 'The Field' was shot here. It was a very short stop and after another 20 minutes we had another stop at the only Irish Fjord out there. The Killary Fjord. It lies very nicley between a few mountains and divides counties Galway and Mayo. It is used for mussel and oyster farming as well since the water is very clear there.

"end" of  a river at Killary Fjord

From there the bus started his Journey to the main destination. Kylemore Abbey with its Victorian Walled Garden. This Abbey is one of Irelands most popular Castles. The castle on which grounds it stays was built from 1867 until 1871.  The gardens were opened to the public in the 1970s. Also on the grounds is a church. Unfortunately I didn't have enough time to go see it all since I had only 2 hours. So on arrival I first went to the gardens. They have shuttle buses going there every 10 minutes. The garden looked very nice and they also opened the gardeners houses to the public. Also behind the walled garden there is a big forest areal. I didn't go there as well due to time issues but I suppose you could go for amazing walks there. After the founder of the castle, Mitchell Henry, sold the estate to the Duke and Duchess of Manchester in 1909 it went up for sale again in 1920 due to the gambling habits of the couple. It was bought by a few Benedictine nuns, who fled from Ypres in Belgium during World War I. These nuns founded the abbey and turned the castle into a boarding school in 1923. In 1959 parts of the castle burned down but were rebuilt. The boarding school was open until 2010 when it was shut down due to decreasing numbers of pupils and the house not being safe anymore. They  also take pride in having had two Indian princesses going there. So here is a little look:

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Kylemore Abbey

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Victorian wall

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first look into the garden

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house of the head gardener

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table inside the head gardener house

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table inside a normal gardeners house (bothy)

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salad and herb garden

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Kylemore Castle charter

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me at Kylemore Abbey

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After Kylemore Abbey there was one more stop in An Spidéal. This is part of what the Irish call the Gaeltacht. This means that the first language here is Gaelic and the second is English. Though most people there are bilingual.

At the last stop

Also it is lambing season so I have to include this picture. They are just the cutest:

lamb - it's lambing season

On Sunday I went on a day trip to Inis Mór. It is the biggest of the three islands forming the Aran Islands. The middle one is Inis Meáin (Inishmaan) and the smallest one is Inis Oírr (Inisheer). They are located in the bay of Galway and reachable by ferries leaving from either Doolin or Rossaveal. Departing in Galway there are shuttle bus services to bring tourists to Rossaveal where one boards the ferry. So that is what I did. On the bus with me where mostly French or German people. In general I feel like here are more European tourists or Americans but not as much Asian tourists as in Germany, Italy or France. I wonder why that is. But back to my weekend: So the bus took me and all the other people to Roosaveal, which took about an hour give or take. The ferry also took about an hour to bring all of us over to Inis Mór. Arriving there I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. I had to decide between hiring a bike, a horse carriage or probably taking a tour on horse back. Since I hadn't booked anything in advance very pretty soon cut back to hiring a bike which is exactly what I did. So I started my way around the island. I stopped along my route fairly often to take in the scenery and the most stunning views. Or at least all that I thought to be the most stunning view without knowing what exactly was there to come. 

Also I met a very friendly donkey (On Monday John and me decided to call him Doug). About an half an hour after I started my tour suddenly my chain sprung out and I had to put it back in. That worked out fine but my hands were quite greasy. Luckily two Japanese women stopped and asked if everything was alright. I said yes but asked if they had any tissues. One had and so we rode together from there. When they stopped to have lunch at the Inis Mór Seal Colony I was about to take off because I didn't bring any lunch with me but they stopped me and told me they would share with me. So after making sure they were really okay with it I ate lunch with them and then we got back on the road. Originally they had planned to go to another attraction than me but because of the time running like crazy they decided to change their plan to come with me. On our way to the most popular sight of Inis Mór we came by a beach with white sand and the Atlantic looked so blue. Looked a bit like in Italy or Greece. It was so beautiful. After that we rode to the most popular attraction of Inis Mór: Dún Aonghasa. It is a hill fort made of limestone from 1100 BC. It looks kind of intimidating. But it is also fascinating to think that even 3100 years ago people lived there and that they built this fort that still stands today. Also it is built directly next to the cliffs  and there are no security lines or safety barriers whatsoever. When I asked a guard about how many people fall down the cliffs he said that no one ever does which I can't completely believe. We had an incredible view and it really look stunning. Also after we spend sometime enjoying we had to start our trip back to Kilronan, where the port is located. But before giving back our bikes we also made a quick stop at the Aran Sweater Market since Aran is mainly famous for it.
But what also was one of my best experiences on Sunday was seeing dolphins. Sadly I got no pictures of them but it was kind of magical.
But see for yourself:

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me overlooking the Atlantic

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stone with the distances to sights

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ruins of a house where I met Doug

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seal colony

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stony coast at Inis Mór

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white beach at Inis Mór

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coast line at Inis Mór

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trail up to Dún Aonghasa

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inner circle of Dún Aonghasa

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the island from the altar at the inner circle

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cliffs at Dún Aonghasa

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Moemi and Hisako

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going down from the inner circle of Dún Aonghasa

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On Monday it was back to work. It was a slow day but John helped me sell two phones and I had a run on finding stuff we were searching for, e.g. an USB that should have went back into an computer. Other than that I just helped customers drop their phone off. And transferred someone contacts from their Alcatel phone to their iPhone SE.

Yesterday I helped the customers. So nothing out of the ordinary. But one thing definitely was out of the ordinary. One customer came in telling me his battery is dead and he want it replaced. It was an iPhone 6 Plus. When I got his details and put the label on the back i noticed the screen coming of at one side. When I told John so he said that the battery is swelled and he'll show me when he gets it out. Well he never could. He opened it and put it on the hot plate to loosen the glue. And suddenly there falmes on the desk John sat at. He first got the phone from the desk and then when it started smoking a lot but without any open fire he got the battery out of the phone and brought it outside and right into a puddle and brought some more water out asap. It was a bit scary. Also I asked him how often that happens and he told me that it was only the third time he witnessed it in all his seven years of phone repairs. Other than that it was just a normal day in the shop.

Today I served customers all day and started on a task Manu, my trainer from Germany, gave me. In the evening I talked a lot to Mackenzie and Maxine about anything and everything and got into some deep stuff about the human species. Also I wrote this post, sorted through all my pictures and cut it down to the 27 that are on here. So sorry for the picture spam but it was freaking hard. Also I now got two other weekends all planned out. But I'm not gonna tell where I go. You'll just have to wait and see.

That's about it for now,I'm off to bed. Stay tuned for more. Cheers!

Juliane