Email Update

I realize that not everyone is on my mass email list for study abroad, so here's my latest email for everyone to read and catch up on my life here in Europe. (And if you're not on my email list and would like to be, shoot me an email.) :)

Hello Everyone!
We are now in Wales! We have a long bus ride this morning, so I’m going to catch up on things.
Have I told you all about Dublin? I can’t remember. Oh yes, I told you mostly about it. Riverdance was awesome!!! I loved it! It was kind of interesting, because while we were waiting for the doors to open, there was a protest going on. I don’t understand completely what was going on, but from what one girl said to me, some of the Irish were protesting that Riverdance was going to go dance in Israel. I guess they are against having the Irish go there?? I’m not sure; all I know that it was loud. We were well taken care of though. Our professors herded us into a corner and we waited for the doors to open. The protestors weren’t violent either, just loud, and there were a lot of police around.
Yesterday we woke up early so that we could have our bus loaded by 6:30am. Whoo! It was early.  We made it though. We drove to the ferry that would take us from Ireland to Holyhead, Wales. (Pronounced holly-head). Our ferry looked like a mini cruise ship. There was places to eat, movie theaters, places to sleep…it was fun. I curled up in a chair for a couple hours to catch up on sleep. When I woke up we were surrounded by water. I found that I don’t enjoy not seeing the land, but I survived. 
We drove to a little town called Beaumaris. I love little towns. Much better than cities. I’m just more of a country girl I guess.  The castle we visited was right at the end of main street (basically the only street in town), about 100 meters from our hotel. The grocery was two stores down, and there were shops lining the rest of the road. Our hotel was wonderful. They fed us dinner and breakfast (both delicious!) which were very fancy. I had bacon and lentil soup (reminded me of you Mom), and cold ham and cheese salad. I was so happy to have some veggies. The places we’ve gone aren’t big on veggies. Then my friend Angela, one of the boys Neil and I each got a different dessert and shared it. Strawberry cheesecake, lemon tart and black currant cake. It was good.
I didn’t really want to be outside long, as by that time it was 7:30pm. I did want to go down to the shoreline though, so the three Gardner boys and I walked down. (The Gardner boys are the sons of one of my professors. They are the only boys on this trip, and their other brother is going to be joining us in a while. They very much remind me of my siblings.) It did me a lot of good to just goof off with them for a while. We threw rocks out into the water, tried to stay out of the way of the incoming tide, and watched the sailboats race across the water.
We are all getting to be really good friends here. Everyone is so kind when one of the girls isn’t feeling well or needs help with something. We’ve had a few get carsick – hopefully that won’t happen too much more.
It is green again. I missed the green of the Irish countryside. Not much of that in Dublin. And there are dogs everywhere! Almost everyone we met on the street in small Beaumaris has a dog with them, and there can’t be that many people in that little town. 
Well, our “tour guide” Angela told us that we are going to visit a hobbit town in a little while. Angela is a grad student who is helping coordinate everything on this trip, but a good friend of us all.
Wales is a beautiful countryside. Green like Ireland, but much different at the same time. We are passing a little valley nestled next to the mountain that I would be very content in staying for a while. More later tonight.
July 1, 2011
Turned out later tonight is actually a day later.  We had to pay for internet at our past hotel, so I thought that I’d wait until tonight to send out the email. Turns out I still have to pay for internet, so I might as well send it. 
We drove for about 6 hours that day until we reached our hotel in Cardiff. My roomie Heidi and I just got some food from the store across the street and stayed in our room for the night. Everyone else went out and got lost in town and didn’t get back in until midnight.
Today we visited Cardiff castle, which is actually a very beautiful castle. Much different than the ones in Ireland that we visited. We also visited a Wales living history museum that was fun to walk through. We ended with Tinturn Abbey, which is ruins of what once was an enormous Abbey. Wales is a very beautiful place.
Tonight we are in Bristol, England. We get to stay at this hostel for three nights (yay!) which is good to have one place to stay in for a while. We are four girls to a room now instead of ten.  Sounds like we have a free day in Bath tomorrow, which we will spend most of the day at.
Love,
Karra