The Vaults

Today went by quickly...I cannot believe we only have three more nights here! We got out of class early and resumed about an hour and a half later to go to the Edinburgh Vaults. The vaults are a series of chambers originally built in the 18th century and are apart of the South Bridge in Edinburgh. The chambers were formed in nineteen arches. These vaults are now hidden by other buildings but they were once inhabited by poor people, were used as a storage for illicit materials, and was a place for serial killers Burke and Hare to hide dead bodies and perform medical experiments on them. Gruesome, right? The vaults are said to be the most haunted place in Great Britain. There are two tours available, the ghost tour and the history tour, and our professor booked the history tour.

Unfortunately it was too dark to get any pictures of the vaults but they were cold, damp, and incredibly creepy. They used animal bones to complete the structure and you could still see them in the wall! Luckily we didn’t get the run down on all of the ghosts that are supposedly living there because I wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight. 

I do have pictures of some other things that happened today!

  

Kelly and I in our matching Dublin sweatshirts--I now have a large ink stain on the sleeve. :(

Troy excited for men’s rowing

After the vaults we saw the longest dog in history. Just kidding, it’s actually two dogs...don’t they look connected?

Lunch time with Zach and Julia

Sophisticated place

Finally some veggies! This greek salad was amazing

Euchre tournament tonight! Zach and I made it to the semi-finals

I finished the outline for my paper and am now heading to bed. Zach was feeling really sick today, I know this because he actually asked for medicine, but hopefully he will feel better by tomorrow! :( Poor little guy.

 We are going to have class, go to a museum, climb the mountain, and go out dancing for our last real night in Edinburgh. 

Updates to come, with love!

Luck of the Irish

Dublin was incredible! We got up at around 5:00 am and took a cab to the airport. We arrived in Ireland sleepy but in one piece!

View from the plane

We took a really cheap bus to our flats and were pleasantly surprised when we got away with shoving fifteen of us in two rooms meant for five people. We promptly took a nap.

Snuggling in bed...6 of us on a full!

After getting some beauty rest we walked in to town (about a 20-25 minute walk) and looked to eat dinner at a pub. The pubs in Dublin are much larger than in London so we were happy to be able to fit us all! The food was phenomenal and we took our time relaxing and chatting until heading back to our flats to watch the opening ceremony of the Olympics. 

Charlie, myself, Zach, Erica

Kelly, Julia, Jess, Megan

We walked past this old church everyday. It is now a medieval museum

This tower was right outside our flats

On Saturday we woke up and took a double decker bus tour of the city. Unfortunately this wasn’t the best way to get pictures but it was interesting to hear about the culture and history of Dublin. 

It started to downpour and Julia’s umbrella flipped inside out...it was hilarious!

Georgian era buildings

Pub

Guinness Storehouse!

I was taking a photo by myself and these guys photobombed me...as you can see I’m extremely comfortable with this

Julia, myself, Megan, Kelly

The factory!

Horse drawn carriages everywhere...they woke me up in the morning!

Having our first pints of Guinness

Locks on the bridge

Following our long day on the bus, we decided to check out the night life in Dublin! We went to a great club that played American ‘90s pop music...we were in our element to say the least. 

Erica, Julia, myself

The group in the flat

Myself, Erica, Connor, Troy

Along with the bus tour we purchased another tour for all day Sunday that took us along the south coast of Ireland and to Powerscourt Gardens. 

River Liffey--it runs through Dublin

Bono lives in this neighborhood. We were also staying right near the hotel that he owns

There was a carnival on the beach!!!

Entrance to Powerscourt Gardens

Tower Valley

Italian Garden

Japanese Garden

Poor Zach cut his elbow on the tower shown above so he’s holding it in this picture :(

Pets' Cemetery...this dog’s name was “The Wup"

Dolphin Pond

Walled Gardens

Julia’s Memorial

Ferraris

All around Europe they have vanilla ice cream with little chocolate sticks...finally got one!

Molly Malone...the most photographed statue in Ireland

Being that Sunday was our last night in Dublin, we found another pub and looked specifically for live Irish music! We found some great musicians but it was mostly American songs. We had a fun last night in town. 

Wall of beer...it is a micro-brewing pub!

Musicians

The next day we had to be out of our flats by 11 am but our flight didn’t leave until 11 pm. Luckily we were able to store our luggage by the front desk and come back for it later. We had an awkward amount of time and couldn’t travel anywhere special so we took advantage of the souvenir shops and the downtown strip (O’Connell Street). Since we had a couple extra hours on our hands we saw The Dark Knight Rises! Brave would have been fun to see since we were in Scotland but unfortunately the movie hasn’t come out there yet. We were all very pleased with Batman and had the perfect amount of time to get our things and head out to the airport.

Our flat! We call ourselves Team Sphinx 

The Spire of Dublin, or the Monument of Light. It was installed in 2002

We landed safely back in Edinburgh around midnight and got back to our flats at around 12:30 am. Ireland was so beautiful and despite getting soaking wet on Saturday during a 10 minute torrential downpour, it is the first city on my list to return to! We were unable to go to the Wicklow National Park (as seen in P.S. I Love You and Braveheart) which we thought we were going to see on Sunday, and we didn’t see any Irish dancing at a pub so I feel like I’ve got some unfinished business to attend to in Ireland. 

Today we had class and went to the Craiglockhart War Museum. It was redone and looks similar to a spaceship so the hospital-feel was hard to grasp. We learned more about shell shock and the war poets, Sassoon and Owen, that stayed and met at Craiglockhart during World War I. The exhibit was much smaller than we had all anticipated but it was still a great experience and will be helpful for writing my paper.

The building to the right was apart of the original hospital (which was actually a spa even before that)

This evening consisted of homework and writing our papers...everyone was shut in their rooms for a few hours. I can’t believe we leave early Saturday morning! Time really flew. Tomorrow we have class and are going on an underground tour of the city.

Phew, if you made it to the bottom you deserve a gold medal. Also...who is viewing my blog in Latvia? 

Updates to come, with love!