U2 Recording Studios & Ghost Tour!!

         Today, we wanted to get up at 8:30 AM, but we ended up getting up at 9:30 AM. We stayed up until about 3 AM last night, and nobody had set any alarms. After we were all up, we decided to try to find a new coffee place to get coffee. The last Coffee place we went to was "Coffee Angel" and we knew of a Coffee place called "Insomnia" nearby. We walked to it, and we got our drinks. There was seating upstairs, and we were the only ones there. Their mocha was good! I also got a blueberry Muffin. 

Sitting upstairs at Insomnia

My Mocha and Blueberry Muffin!!

        The Muffin was really good! After that, we walked back to the house to ask my dad if we could go shopping. On Grafton street, if you take 2 side-roads, there is an Arcade. Not a gaming arcade. In Europe, an "Arcade" is like a shopping center or mall. We told my dad, then we started to walk toward the Arcade. When we got there, we walked into all the stores. There was cool clothing stores, jewelry stores, and food. Max, Caleb, and Ben got posters. I got 3 little charm items. We then walked back to our house. 

       Every Thursday, there is a thing in our park where there are tents with different food shops. We went across to check that out. I got tea. Ben got lemonade, and Caleb got a Hot Chocolate. Here's a picture of the park. 

Park right across the street from my house!

      After we visited our park to see the tent market, we went back to the house for a while. At about 4:30 PM, we started to walk down to where my mom works to meet her and her friend Sue, so that we could go check out the U2 Recording Studios. Its where they record their music and there is really cool Graffiti. We met my mom and Sue, then we went down to the U2 Studios. There was a good view, and some nice artwork. Its near the water. 

Right by U2 Recording Studios.

Aparently the red poles are "Trees" and the Green benches are "Grass" 

       We got to where all the cool Graffiti is painted on the walls, and we took lots of pictures. There is a lot of Graffiti and it looks so cool because its just on random buildings that random people created. 

Graffiti!

This is art.

El Papel 

Awesome!1

WOAH... Creepy...

        The art was really cool! It was a fun place to take a lot of pictures. We were done taking pictures, so my mom decided to take us all to a new Coffee place on the way home. It was just a little store, and I got a Latte! It was delicious!

Drinking our Lattes and our Hot Chocolates! (Me and  Max got the Lattes)

     My Mom and Sue had to go back to my Moms work, so Me, Caleb, Ben, and Max walked home. We got home, and we had to eat dinner because we had a Ghost Tour at 8:00 PM. We got home, and my dad was making dinner. He made some bread, and sauce, and he was making Tortellini. It was really good! I ate a lot of it. 

        After we had dinner, we had to quickly get to the place where the Ghost Bus would pick us up. My mom got an Uber, and Sue hailed a cab because we needed 2 cars for all my friends plus my mom and Sue. We got there just on time. We looked at the bus and it looked really cool! 

Ghost Bus IF YOU DARE!!

      We walked on the Bus, and it didn't look like a Bus at all! I walked in, and it looked like a scary hallway in a Haunted House! There was a little room, and upstairs, it was like tables, and really creepy! It was so dark because the curtains it was amazing! Our guide was really enthusiastic. We stopped at Dublin castle, and a Graveyard. Here are some pictures of the inside of the Ghost Bus!

Walking onto the Bus!

This is in the Bus!!!

2nd floor of the Bus.

Were so scared lol

       When we went to the Graveyard, he told us a scary story about how a guy on his tour before found his name on a Gravestone at the Graveyard. He said that the man found his name on the Gravestone March 16, and the date that his name died on the Gravestone was, March 17. The man thought it was a sign. Thats pretty weird. I took a lot of cool Black-&-White pictures!

This is cool.

Little area with no roof.

Graveyard <3

     The whole thing was a really fun experience. The guy was really fun, and we visited 2 cool places. The Bus was really cool. I didn't think that the inside of a Bus could look exactly like a Haunted House. Its so cool! I wish I had that Bus. After the Ghost Tour, my Mom and Sue went out, so Me, Max, Ben and Caleb were left with my Google Maps to walk home. The map said it was 31 minutes away, but we ran most of it, and it took us like 15 minutes. We were finally home, and we had to go to bed early so that we could get up early in the morning the next day.

     Tomorrow, we are going to the West part of Ireland for about 3 days. We had to pack some clothes. We are going to be staying in a Bed & Breakfast. We are going over to the West part of Ireland to visit Giants Causeway, and Skellig Michael (the movie at the end of Star Wars The Force Awakens) Its going to be really cool!


More Pictures: 

LOL

At the Dublin Castle!

By U2 Recording Studios!

Drinking Lattes and Hot Chocolates!

Under Dublin Castle!

              -6/16/2016

  
       

Day 2 Shopping Spree!!

      Today was the 2nd day here with my friends. Last night was the first night that they all spent here. We all slept in my room on the 5th floor. It has its own kitchen, so we got a lot of food from the store yesterday to put in our kitchen. We drink a lot of Tea. Last night, I stayed up until about 3 AM. I woke up at 10 AM, and we all went down to eat breakfast.

       My dad made us sausage, scrambled eggs, and toast. We all ate, and then we started to walk down the street to where we would go on a Viking Splash Tour. The last time I was here, I went on the same tour, but this time I was going to take my friends along with me! We got the same tour guide I had last time. He was really funny! He gave us history of the tour, and we scared some random people.

On the Viking Tour (with Ben, Caleb, Max)

It kinda started to rain.

We were wearing Viking Helmets.

It went in the water also.

         We got Starbucks right before we went on the tour. We scared a lot of people. When we went in the water, we saw the headquarters for Facebook, and Google. Google has 6 buildings in Dublin, and people from 40 countries speaking more than 60 different languages! Thats Google for ya. 

    

     We had a lot of fun on the Viking Tour. Once the tour ended, it was about Noon time. We decided to walk straight down Grafton street. That was the street that had a lot of stores on it. We started to walk down it, and we went in a lot of stores. I was just excited to go to the store "Lush". Lush is a Handmade Cosmetics store. They have Bath Bombs, so I wanted to buy some. 

    

      There were a lot of street performers on Grafton street. They were playing an instrument, or singing and playing guitar trying to get money. We kept walking down, and we finally got to Lush. I went in, and it was amazing! They had a lot of different kinds of Bath Bombs. If you don't know what a Bath Bomb is, its a dry circle made of dry materials, that expand in a bath, and add color, scent and essential oils to a bath. They look really cool! Heres an example. 

This is what a Bath Bomb does to your water, and it smells really good also!! 

         I spent about 48 Euros at Lush. I got different types of bath bombs. The people at Lush were really nice, they told me what kinds of bath bombs were their favorites. I got about 7 different ones, all different kinds. Here is what inside of Lush looked like...

Different Bath Bombs inside of Lush.

     Here is what I ended up buying from Lush...

       After we visited some more stores, we started to walk back on Grafton Street. On the way back, we saw a guy starting a street performance, but it wasn't someone just playing music, it was one of them that could juggle, and ride a unicycle. He had a 10 foot unicycle, 7 green balls, and 4 torches with fire. He did his performance and he was really funny! He could juggle very well, and he juggled 3 knives on top of his 10 foot unicycle! It was amazing! 

       After that, my Dad and I walked back to the house, while Ben, Caleb, and Max continued to shop. My Dad and I walked through St. Stephens Green. That's the park that is about 2 blocks away from my house. It was pretty, and we saw a cool statue! I took a Black and White picture of it.

The Statue we saw.

                -6/15/2016

Fun first day in Dublin!!

        When we got to our house, it was about 10 AM Ireland Time. Since Caleb and I didn't sleep at all, we were a bit tired. I took a nap for about 2 hours, and woke up at about 12:30 PM. My mom had to try to get me up about 5 times before I actually got up. When we were all up, we started to walk around Dublin. We walked down the street that our house was on, and we found this really cool Coffee place called Coffee Angel. Caleb got a Hot Chocolate, and Me, Max, and Ben each got Mochas. They were really good!

Coffee Angel Mocha.

Coffee Angel (Right across from my house!)

      After we went to Coffee Angel, we started our walk to Trinity College, which is where the Book Of Kells is kept. They turn a page every day. The Book Of Kells contains the 4 Gospels of the New Testament written in Latin. 

     

     After that, we started to walk over to St. Michan's Church, because they have 2 Crypts under the church available for the public to see. We went in the church, and a really enthusiastic man greeted us and took us to both of the Crypts. We saw preserved bodies from 400-800 years ago. Some of the bodies feet had to be cut off so that they could fit in the coffins. Here are some pictures we took. 

Graveyard above the ground.

Preserved bodies underneath the church.

      Our guide told us that the limestone underground kept the crypts underground the same temperature the whole year, no matter the seasons. After we saw the crypts, we started to walk to Christ Church. I have been there before, but Max, Caleb, and Ben haven't. We also went to St. Patrick's Cathedral. We did a quick walk-through of each church, here are some pictures that we took.  

Black and White!

Candels!

     After we saw those 2 churches, we walked back to our house. When we got home, my mom started to make us pizzas, and all of us walked to the store. The nearest store is called "Tesco". Its pretty much a mini version of Meijer. When we got home, the pizza was ready. After we had pizza, we were going to go to a party at 7 PM for my moms work friends that are moving to Ireland with her. 

                -6/14/2016

 

We Arrived at the House!!!

       We finally got to our house in Ireland! After Atlanta, we got on our next plane, and it was a 7 hour plane ride. On the plane, we would arrive in Ireland, at 8:30 AM, their time. We were suppose to sleep on the plane so that we could adjust to the Ireland time zone, which is 5 hours ahead of Grand Rapids, Michigan. The plane had TV's so we could watch movies, and they gave us a blanket and a pillow.

7 Hour plane ride!

View from the sky!!

Us on the Atlanta to Dublin plane!!

        On the plane, since there were TV's, Caleb and I watched "The Fifth Wave" together. After that, I watched 2 more movies. On the plane, Ben and Max slept, but Caleb and I didn't sleep. When we got to Ireland, it was about 2:30 AM in Grand Rapids, but it was 8:30 AM in Ireland, so we would have to stay up until the night to get on the schedule.

Ben and Max sleeping. 

     On the plane, they had 2 meals. They had Dinner first, during the beginning of the plane ride. They also had Breakfast near the end of the plane ride since it was Breakfast time in Ireland where we would be landing. The Dinner plane food was really good! I got chicken, mashed potatoes, a salad, bread, and cheese!

Our Plane food Chicken Dinner!!

     The plane ride was pretty quiet, and Ben and Max were sleeping during the second half of the plane. After breakfast, we had about 2 hours before we landed. Once we landed, we got off our plane, and we got all of our 8 bags from the baggage claim. We took them to the Taxi line, and we got a Taxi and took it to our house. 

Taking our stuff to the Taxi.

      We gave a tour of the house to Caleb, Max, and Ben. Then we decided to relax because we were all tired, and after 2, Me, Caleb, Max and Ben were all going to walk around and go to the stores and stuff.

Us Arriving at the house!

             -6/14/2016

 

Atlanta Airport Update!

       This morning, I got up at 7:30 AM. I woke up and all the Luggage was in the car. All of my friends were driving to the airport individually, so I left for the airport at 8:30 AM. I got to the airport right when Max got there. Caleb and Ben were there already, so we all went to check our bags. My mom had a lot of bags to check because she had things in there for the house. Caleb, Max, and Ben all had one bag to check. We had a total of 8 bags checked.

Checking our Bags!

Ready to go! 

About to leave!

      Everyone said goodbye to their parents, and we headed through security. We headed to our gate, then we got on our first airplane to go to Atlanta. When we got on the plane, we let Caleb sit at the window seat because he had never been on a plane before. We kept making jokes about how Caleb was scared because he had never been on a plane, but he really wasn't scared. He seemed to really enjoy the pane ride.

Happy Caleb!

Panda!

         When we got to Atlanta, Me, Caleb, and Ben ate at the original "El Taco". Ben got nachos, and Caleb and I both got different types of Burritos. They were really good! After we ate at "El Taco" we went to another restaurant called "One Flew South" and Max got Sushi. That place was really fancy, and they had wines that caused $415!

The Original El Taco!!

Burritos from The Original El Taco!

"One Flew South" (Max had Sushi)

       We have a 6 hour layover in Atlanta, and then we have our final flight to Dublin, and were getting there in the morning! 

                                  -6/13/2016