Donegal! (tons of pictures)

Hey there dear readers,

I went to Donegal last weekend, specifically Malin Head. It's the most northern point in all of Ireland. It was absolutely beautiful, and it was a much needed reminder of what brought me to Ireland in the first place. The locals were absolutely charming and the scenery was divine. I did, however, come back incredibly sick. Turns out I developed bronchitis while there, which has also been the reason for my lack of blog posts.

Radhika is here with a UC (University of California) program and a bunch of people in her program arranged a trip to Malin Head, they had some spots and Radhika invited me to come along. That's how I managed to find myself in rural Ireland with a bunch of Californians.

We stayed in the best hostel ever. It was my first time ever staying in a hostel, but i've seen the movie, so my expectations weren't very high. This place though was clean, cozy and charming. The owners are this sweet old couple who were more than helpful.

From the common room you could see the beach.

 The view from that window a bit closer...

I loved the decor and style of this place, it's so beachy and rustic.

One of the rooms (they all slept 12 people) also had an amazing view of the beach, we were all starting to miss the sun.

First view of wildlife! These sheep were grazing right behind the hostel

We all decided to go on a walk and explore. For about 5 minutes we were all together, after that Radhika and I totally lost the whole group due to our incessant photo taking.

More sheep! We soon discovered that they were everywhere...

Some strange ruins I couldn't tell you anything about.

Nerd alert.

We were so happy to have sun!!! Even if it was still cold.

I just thought this was adorable.

More sheep? No way!!!!

It's a lil black baby sheep!

Then, out of nowhere, it started snowing/hailing(we're Californian, we don't know the difference)

That snow/hail storm was brief, but it was followed by freezing random bursts of wind and rain.

Since it was getting cold, Radhika and I decided to turn around and head back down the long road we had been heading up. But we had wanted to go into "town" (A convenience store, gas station, and pub/restaurant)  to buy some food, so we passed our hostel, braving the wind.

Thank god only about 5 minutes passed when this couple driving by stopped alongside us and asked where we were headed, we told them and they offered to give us a ride.

Eugene and Cathy, Donegal natives, live next door to the hostel. They were so sweet, they even waited for us outside the store as we bought pasta (Radhika) and soymilk and cereal (I never claimed to be a grown up). Cathy and Eugene brought us back to the hostel, and we were so grateful. It was soooo freezing out there! We went inside and decided to grab lunch as we warmed up. We then met roommates Luann and Carol, eating lunch in the common room. Luann is from North Carolina and Carol is German (although she used to live in texas and was married to an American). The two women were both in their 50's, possibly 60's and had come up from Dublin for the weekend. We got to talking and these ladies invited us to come along on their drive exploring the area. We jumped at this opportunity, it was exactly what we had set out to do on foot hours earlier but now we would have the comfort and warmth of Luann's car. So the four of us hit the road.

We discovered long haired cows!!

Oxen?

The homes in Donegal were beautiful.

Luann told us if we passed anybody in our group (who still hadn't returned to the hostel at this point even though we'd all left hours earlier) that she'd slow down so we could wave at them. She was quite a character that Luann.

Luann and Carol, showing what to do if we passed anybody in our group walking in the cold.

This shop was curious.

Radhika made a friend!

My blessing for all of you...

Another brief hail/snow storm!

That's right...

MY PIGGY BANK...fc.

Carol and Luann were the funniest duo because Luann is barely 5 ft tall, and pretty small, and Carol is about 5'9, and not so small.

They were definitely a sight for sore eyes.

 Gorgeous.

We pulled into a driveway to turn around at one point and saw a bunch of roosters with one duck.

To quote Luann, "now that's diversity."

There's a lot of fishing going on up here, and Luann and Carol had their heart set on some lobster.

We pulled into this....fish dispensary (?).....so Luann and Carol could buy some lobster. The owner informed them that "a bunch of American girls had just stopped by and bought him out." (Those American girls were from our group).

He's just covering all his bases.

After about 40 minutes of driving around, we went back to the "town" (Cathy and Eugene didn't even have to give us that ride!) and stopped at the restaurant/pub. Radhika and I both got Irish coffees, although mine was a vegan and less pretty version (no whipped cream) and a plate of garlic chips which were delicious.

Up until this point I forgot to mention that there was a wedding taking place in the tiny town of Malin head this day. We had encountered the limo and the bridal party earlier when we first started our walk. By the time the four of us got to this restaurant, the wedding party was in the pub half. One party member, self titled "big bad John", popped over to the restaurant side and made our acquaintance.


Big Bad John was a 50 something year old man who had definitely been drinking. I made eye contact with him as he was walking across the room and he stopped, smiled and waved hi to me for about 30 seconds before changing directions and coming to our table.

Luann asked him about the wedding and asked if he was with the bride, to which he replied "yeah the bride, the big FAT bride" with a huge laugh.  He then looked at me and Radhika and told Luann that we would make beautiful brides. Luann told him we were her granddaughters, hoping it would shame him from hitting on us (50 something year old men only hit on 20 year olds when their grandma isn't around, duh). After this Big Bad John turned to Carol. Now this is, quite honestly, what made the trip. Let's just say this....John was fishing and Carol was nibbling. John at one point stroked Carol's hair. After his drunken flirting had lost his charm, Luann said, "well it was nice meeting you!" and John shook all of our hands and said goodbye. But then....he didn't leave. He stood there, at our table, continuing to talk to us. About 2  minutes later we all said bye and he shook our hands again. Oh Big Bad John, you charmer.

Thank god they speak blarney!!

I took a picture of this cat food because I was so sure, up until 30 seconds ago,  that this exact brand was called something different in America. I was going to write, "In Ireland they have whiskas instead of whiskey." Then I realized....it's probably not called whiskey in America, and after googling it, I realized my hopeful imagination had tricked me yet again, and it is in fact also called whiskas back home.

Too bad, I'd definitely feed meatball some whiskey.

I just thought this cat food was funny.

As I mentioned in my blog about food, they have some pretty crazy chip flavors over here. Right now, their Lays equivalent, Walkers, is holding a "mystery flavour" challenge.

Radhika and I were curious as to what the ingredients were in this mystery bag, and to our delight, the "mystery meat flavour potato crisps" are actually vegan! No....we didn't buy them, although I was quite tempted.

Sun again!!

After a few pictures we headed back to the hostel, Carol was asking about heading back to that pub later, Luann replied, "Yeah Carol, wanna see Big Bad John again?" Carol blushed and didn't laughed off this suggestion, but we all knew she did.

Back at the hostel they had a bookcase where you could exchange a book of yours for one of theirs. I didn't make a trade because I didn't have a book on me, but I decided to borrow a book for the night when this gem caught my eyes.

They're right, there really isn't anything worse than a bent copper.


Goodnight dear readers!!