living on another continent for a week..

in january my youngest sister left for glasgow, scotland for 6.5 months to complete a semester of studying abroad. she was given an amazing opportunity and she grabbed onto that opportunity with passion and braveness. anyways, her choosing to study in glasgow presented me with an opportunity i could not and would not turn down. i got to visit her! i booked a week off work and got to visit my sister and three amazing cities!

unfortunately i could only afford to get one week off work (since i'm still only on a temporary employment contract).. but we were able to make the best of that one week. we made sure two weeks worth of sightseeing, attractions, tours and food made it all into the one week we had.

Friday May 31

my friend meagan and i flew out of toronto to dublin, ireland at 1140 pm. the flight was about six hours but because ireland is 5 hours ahead of toronto time, we arrived around 11am on June 1.

Saturday June 1

11 am we arrived in dublin, our bodies thinking it is 6 am but our brains overwhelmed with excitement.   we got out luggage and dropped them off at storage so we could go explore the city of dublin a bit before our flight to glasgow that night. we got into a taxi (15 minutes drive from airport city centre) and off we went to do a tour of the Guinness storehouse. for any beer/guinness fans - this is the place to be. it was a self guided tour of the whole process of making guinness including a taste testing experience and a lesson on pouring the perfect pint of the good stuff.

 welcome to the Guinness Storehouse, Dublin

 Guinness bottles and products over the years

 just a little bit of information about Arthur Guinness

 sort of like wine tasting -there is a certain way Guinness should be experienced and each of these 5 steps should be appreciated (listen to the hissing, look at the surge of gases, pour and serve at specific temperature, smell the aroma and taste the mix of flavours on the tongues palate)

 i got a lesson on how to pour the perfect pint of Guinness..

 ..and i got a certificate for pouring it properly

the guinness storehouse tour was fun! did you know there is only four ingredients in making Guinness -(barley, hops, water and yeast).. but then there is three different roasts (or whatever you would call it) of barley itself to give Guinness its unique flavour and smooth texture. i learned lots of useless information but facts and facts right. i love learning and knowing facts. 

after we finished the tour and drank some of our perfectly poured pints (my friend doesn't like beer and my body was very confused why i was drinking beer so early in the morning) we back tracked where our taxi had brought us and made our way back into town by foot. we walked around for two and a half hours to so, enjoyed some street music and went to check out temple bar.

temple bar is not one bar but a whole little area or community of pubs surrounded by narrow cobblestone streets.. the nightlife is exciting in this area, with live music at many of the pubs that can be heard out in the streets.. and other bars/pubs have irish dance shows. 

around 5 pm meg and i headed back to the airport to pick up our luggage from storage and got on our 7pm flight to glasgow, scotland (it was only about an hour flight). we arrived in glasgow shortly after 8pm and my sister was at the airport waiting for us! we caught a bus back to her flat to drop our luggage off, walked around the area for about an hour, got some snacks from the grocery store and turned on a movie. after about half an hour we were all ready to pass out in exhaustion so we just went to sleep with an exciting week ahead :)

stay tuned for many more pictures