One last, very long, post from Ireland!

Its been forever since our last update so get ready, this is going to be big! We have been busy all these weeks with lots of fun stuff to share with our faithful followers!

Quite literally the only thing we did in the days following St. Paddy's Day was write our final papers.... whooo hooo. So nothing to report there, but then Katie's family came! Mom, Dad, sisters Kara and Amy, uncles Jon, Joe, and Kevin all came to spend some time on the island. While it rained a majority of the time (first rainy week since we arrived), there was still a lot accomplished! The girls all made a trip to Paris as part of Kara's belated graduation present. Lots of walking, some shopping, and sightseeing at all the usual spots- including a very interesting Eiffel Tower experience. Camille stayed in Paris to meet up with some friends to start her two week European tour and the rest went back to Ireland to continue on with the boys. The rest of the vacation was spent in pubs and on the road (Jon got to be an expert at driving a large van on the wrong side of the car and road), with the Cliffs of Moher and parts of the Connemara area being explored. Fun to have them here, sad to see them go....

PARIS: Camille's stay- Well on Wednesday I made my way over to another hostel to meet up with Allison and Estef. The three of us then headed out to the Louvre as the weather was not too great. We walked all around the Louvre for 4 hours. Seriously. There was tons to see and we got in free with our European student IDs. Awesome. Later that evening Lizzi came to join us and we had a mini Luther reunion with Erik too! Thursday we did some more epic walking up to Sacre Couer and Mon Martre and over to the Eiffel Tower. Friday was a day for Versailles. The typical meal while in Paris consisted of a baguette, Camabert cheese, apples, and the occasional crepes. Most importantly...macarons! Katie joined on Saturday. The majority of that day was spent walking around Paris and just enjoying being there! And it rained....

MARSEILLE: Sunday morning we left for Marseille via train. The journey lasted about 3 hours. Katie slept for most of it and Camille was awed by the French landscape. Marseille was the place where it had been decided we were just going to take it easy. Sunday afternoon we walked to St. Vincent's Church and saw the crypt and just got our bearings of the city. We passed through a small market where an American woman was trying to pay with American currency and when the teller was making conversation about where they were from and such the woman replied, "the States". Well duh, the French aren't stupid lady. This is why Americans have a bad rep. as tourists...Anyway, the next day we walked to some more lovely cathedrals and had a cappuccino and banana split on the port where we got some sun. Lovely!

BARCELONA: After a very lengthy bus ride, we finally arrived in this beautiful city! While there, we saw Casa Mila, Sagrada Familia, and accidentally climbed the mountain trying to get to Park Guell. Also, we spent a few hours at the beach where we got harassed by women wanting us to pay them for a massage every thirty seconds. This is also the city were Katie FINALLY got her Starbucks, although they did not have coffee based ANYTHING for some ungodly reason... AND they didn't take gift cards, but whatever. It was still good! This was our favorite stop and we each got an adorable scarf to remember it by :)

ROME: Basically....we walked the city to death seeing a ton of sweet stuff. We saw the Colosseum, the Pantheon, a ton of Piazzas and water fountains, and the Spanish Steps, and I am sure that there are more things that I could list as well...We also went to Vatican City! It was a Sunday, so the museums were closed. But, we got to attend Mass in St. Peter's Basilica which was cool, however, it was in Latin and Italian and there were people in Mass that would try and take pictures the entire time. Rather annoying. Probably the best part of Rome was the Gelato. We had it four times and the last time we enjoyed it was also the best. It was the cheapest thus far and it was the best quality, and while enjoying it we watched an albatross kill and devour a pigeon. Free gelato-dinner entertainment!

N. IRELAND: After our lovely slumber party in the airport (1/2 on the floor in check-in, 1/2 in Starbucks!), we made our way to Belfast. We killed some time at Queen's University, the museum and the Botanic Gardens until our room at the hostel was ready. When it was we took a much needed four-hour nap, then we went back to sleep after dinner. Glorious! The next day we boarded a tour bus to Carrick-a-Rede Ropebridge, Giant's Causeway, and (London)Derry- all very cool spots! The plan in Derry was supposed to be to catch a bus straight to Galway at 4pm. Here is what actually happened: We got the ticket window and found out that the last bus to Galway was at 3:15pm... the only bus we could get would be halfway to Sligo... We thought we could do that and then catch the connecting bus five minutes later to make the rest of the trip... We got to Sligo to find out that the second bus was only on Fridays... the next bus to Galway was at 6am the next morning, it was 9:30pm... we went to a pub across the street from the bus station (mmm, Smithwicks)... met the very nice bartender who was previously a student at NUIG... stayed there til 3:30am... ended up with only two hours to kill til the bus came! FINALLY made it back to Galway at about 9am and took the longest, most amazing shower that ever happened. And then took another one today! And we also ate food!!

Now we are sitting on the couch, eating noodles and watching the Ninja episode of Myth Busters. Tomorrow is another trip to the Cliffs and hopefully, if the volcano in Iceland cooperates, we will be on a plane home on Tuesday morning! Wish us luck- goodness knows we need luck while traveling... See you sooooooooon!

LOVE.