Connemara Tour (29.10.)

Connemara vs. Cliffs of Moher: 1:0!
Unfortunately, we had to realise that we didn't have enough days to go to the Cliffs of Moher and Connemara National Park. Since there were some people who didn't want to go to the Cliffs because they claimed already having seen the most beautiful cliffs elsewhere, we finally decided to go to Connemara altogether.
Going there on our own wasn't really an option without a car, so we booked a bus tour. One of the ones offered at the hostel. After having a funny conversation about if it's okay to do a tour that starts at 10, or if that's still in the middle of the night. xD
However, we did the tour at 10. And this time, we didn't even have to search for the bus stop, because they had a pick-up service at our hostel. Pure luxury. B-)
Since I don't have time for explanations (who would have thought that!), I just provide the link to the hopefully official website of Connemara here. And, of course, the inevitable map in order to illustrate where we've been (approximately - don't know where exactly in Connemara though):

Overview. That's really the other side of Ireland now. :-D

Closer, so that you can actually see the shape of the area.

Yeah, and now, I'll just spam you with looots of pictures of the beautiful landscape there. And, like the day before, we were quite lucky again: the weather wasn't really Irish, which really improved the view and therefore also the pictures we could take. Unfortunately, my camera couldn't bear the beauty of the nature anymore. Plainly said: the battery was empty. So if you can recognize a visible discontinuity in the quality of my pictures - that was when I was forced to change from camera to mobile phone. ;-)

For the sake of the running gag (and for Laetitia): oh, sheep! <3

Ross Errilly Friary

Not really sure about the difference between friary and monastery (they have the same German translation, but probably it's about some details). Anyway, monks lived here.

More important...

Landscape!

Nice view out of the window. ;-)

Thus: picture stop! xD

Oh, more sheep! (And our bus in the background.)

Cong

Stop in this village to go to the toilet, get some hot chocolate at the cute café,...

Landscape again!

Kylemore Abbey & Victorian Walled Gardens

Was a school run by nuns, now only nuns live here, because they make more money with tourists than with students. Official reason is something else, of course... 

On the toilet: that's language proficiency!! xD

Yep, fireplaces again. :-P

Gothic church.

Oh, sheep...?! xD

More landscape

List of everything we saw on that day, according to the bus tour company:

I'm not going to check that, for obvious reasons...

Inishmor, Aran Islands (28.10.)

After weeks of delay, I'm finally doing the separate posts about the study week - the ones I had announced in my overview post, don't know when exactly. I hope nobody died of curiosity in the meantime... :-P

So, on our first full day in Galway, we went to the Aran Islands. Since I don't expect anyone to be better in geography than I am (and I suck at it...), I'm just so nice as to show them on a map. I definitely didn't have a clue about them before.

Overview about the general location of them.

Close-up, so that Google Maps actually shows the names of them.

Obviously, it's a group of islands in the North Atlantic. We only went to the biggest of them, Inishmor. The reason for that is simple: the ferry only went there. xD
First we had to take the shuttle bus (no, first we had to find it, actually). We spent almost an hour in the bus, before we finally took the ferry for another 45min or so. Although it was slightly raining, somebody wanted to have the Titanic experience on deck. Yeah, what else is there to say, I had to sing My Heart Will Go On...
The view was nice, although the weather wasn't as nice:

Once arrived on (? - prepositions are mean) Inishmor, we decided to rent bikes for the day. Or, let me put it this way: I was decided to do so - peer pressure... Fact is, I hadn't been on a bike for at least seven years. So I was more like: is that really necessary? >.<
Well, yes, it was necessary.

The enemy. :-P

No, actually, it was quite okay. I mean, at least, I didn't fall off the bike. And I was for sure not the only one who was almost dying on the way uphill. But still, I wanted to kill people who could ride a bike, enjoy the landscape and take pictures of other people riding a bike at the same time...

Example picture. I don't intend to kill the photographer, whoever it was...

And since I had a look at the time (I have classes later), I'm not going to continue with any more blah blah here, but just add "a few" pictures. Enjoy!

Oh, cows!! Surprise, surprise! xD

Oh, donkey! (That's new now :-D)