13 hours later and I am feeling 100% better. There's something to be said for a good night's sleep and Nyquil.

Anywho, let's start the recap:

Barcelona

I believe I left y'all on Wednesday night, while I was distressing about having broken out in a rash for the second time! Well, in 'mysterious break-out' department, I've had no more surprises...yeah!!!

Wednesday evening we decided to 'go out' with a couple of Americna gals we had met at the dodgy hostel the first night. Because we were all being rather cheap, we decided that going out would involve picking up cheap liquor at the SPAR and drinking on the beach. I bought a one-litre carton of Sangria for 1.50 Euros and was v suspicous that it could taste of anything other than some gross cough medicine. I was wrong, very wrong. It turns outwine really is cheaper than water in Spain..and delicious! We ended up drinking with some very random people we met on teh beach - very random, indeed. One guy was a DJ, another a male stripper. Ahem. We also ended up meeting a guy from Quebec and his French friend. Spanish, French, German and English were all practiced and spoken very poorly that night.

The next day, afer 3 glorious hours of sleep, Jen & I moved to a new pension - a steal at 15 euro each for a private room in city centre!! Let's Go rules! We ended up walking our asses off (literally, I swear I have nothing to sit on now), and eventually found the Olympic Stadium. jen needs some new golas in terms of what she wants to see in a city - how about a church?? More plentiful and centrally located!!! That evening, with cash on the low I decided that Jen & I should go out to eat on my MAstercard. We found a decent deal on Las Ramblas (the tourist street of Barcelona). A three course meal was advertised at 9 Euros. The food was mediocre - nothing amazing, but decent enough after days of bread & cheese diet. The outrgae came, however, when I rec'd teh bill and found we had been charged 4.30 Euro for each Coke Lite we had ordered. That's $6.50 each!! Oh, I was not impressed!

Dublin

Thursday was travel and wait at airport day. The trip was pretty non-eventful, save for hte fact that I forgot I was going to a cooler climate so my tank top did nothing to stop the biting wind at the London Stansted airport. Lovely.

Anyways, I got settled in to my B&B in Dublin and went out to meet a couple of people I needed to see. And, I must say, that while I was apprehensive about my second meet-up of the evening, it was by all accounts, absolutely necessary and entirely successful in abolishing any lingering doubts I may have had. Suffice to say I am finally cured. No more time or energy to be wasted on the undeserving.


Limerick

I was supposed to land in Ennis, but the bloody bus was super late and I was super tired, so I decided to take a B&B in Limerick. My second enticement for staying in Limerick was that Blue Moose was playing in the city that evening!! Unfortunately, they ended up not playing their gig, due to another band already setting up at the venue - a confusion in calendars. They were meant to be playing in Kilkenny. In the end, I tucked myself into bed early and had a good night's rest. The next morn I checked out Limerick, aka 'Stab City' and found it to be less than endearing..except for all the references to Shannon. I took a picture of the River Shannon!

Killarney

I landed here and instantly fell in love with this little town. It is so quaint and Irish, plus it happens to be just adjacent to a huge National Park and some amazing scenery. I wakled through part of the park and checked out a castle. Back at the hostel I met 3 of my roommates and discovered they were from Canada! We all ended up going out on the town and free drinks were served up all evening by Murphy's promoter and high rollers from London.

Yesterday I woke up sick, but went for a tour in Seamus (the Canadian girls' rented car) and did the Ring of Kerry. Spectacular scenery, breathtaking. I wish I hadn't been so sick.

And that leaves me here, on my way to Kilkenny - another long bus trip....yeah!!

Hey all. Well, I should probably write a massive post tonight because it's been a few days and A LOT of things have happened, but I simply can't. I am just too sick. yep, that's right, my Ireland holiday has been marred by sickness, which pretty much hit me the day I left Barcelona. A combination of stress, long bus rides and short sleeps has not been the best remedy for recuperaion. So, I will write when I can and try to tell you everything.....for now I am going to sleep.

Asta La Vista

Hot! Hot! Hot! The temperature, the men, this country! 30 degrees today people, 30 degrees centigrade on May 3rd. Phew, I musthave melted a few pounds off today. Unfortunately, I am quite sure I consumed a few pounds today in chocolate, candy, gelato, etc. Oh and half a kilo of strawberries. Ah but I am getting ahead of myself. Let´s start from the beginning....

OK, so Valencia was amazing. Our second day we did what any sane-minded person would do - we laid in the sun, ate sinful foods and basically did as little as possible. We started this strenuos day in the city park, which is actually a dried-up river bed that runs through the middle of the city. Its been landscaped since then and is gorgeous. We ate the strawberries we had got at Valencia´s marke, apparently the biggest in Eurpe. One kilo of delicious strawberres for 90 cents!!!

Eventually we dragged ourselves to the beach and laid in the sun. I waded into the Mediterranean, but didn´t make the full plunge...

The evening was spent wandering the streets and then trying to figure out where we were going to g the next day. Jen & had scrapped our plans to go inland due to travelling time and lure of the coastal towns.

We eventually decided to head to Tarragona, a medium ized city about an hour from Barcelona. The main attractions: another beach!!! and some Roman ruins (been there, done that in Italy).

Anyways, Tarragona was fabulous, nt least because we had a private room with shwer for 17 euro each wth a balcony that overlooked a lovely plaza.

The main highlights in Tarragona were:

the beach - I had a lovely siesta mid-afternoon

the promenade and main street - absolutely gorgeous, with palm trees and all that jazz

getting invited to join a stag party - three Canadian girls and about 15 Spanish guys..only one of whom spoke decent English. Ah, but it was all good and free drinks are always appreciated. Sadly, the husband to be was dressed up as dynamite and only getting married because the bride was pregnant....

the Carinapizza Jen & I had at a restaurant - it was gorgeous to look at and delicious to taste. We didn´t know what we had ordered but found ourselves chowing down on a pizza with big strips of bacon, red peppers, NO tomato sauce AND a huge egg fried into the middle - it was yummy!!

Yesterday we arrived in Barcelona an, cross my fingers, that was the low point of my holiday. It was raining when we arrived, the hostel we had booked was dodgy to say the least, particularly the area in which it was located. No one who I had hoped to hear from had contacted me (ahem!) and I had to cancel my Visa because I couldnt find it. However, the most disturbing part of the day was when, about an hour after we left our dodgy hstel, I completely broke out on both my arms. It started on one hand, with what looked like bug bites, then travelled up most of my arm and formed a huge red rash. Then noticed the same thing was happening on my other arm. I freaked. Jen remained calm and useful. I feared the worst : bed bugs! I rushed to a pharmacy and the woman would only give me allergy medicine, depsite my insisting I am not allergc o anything. I shelled out 6 euros for the tablets, but popped into the next pharmacy, where they gave me a foam to rub on teh rash. That worked like a miracle and I was all better in mere minutes of putting it on. Was still wary about staying at hostel, but in the end we did because it wuld have cost too much to switch . I know now that it wasn´t bed bugs, but I still don´t know what it was....

Today was lovely - sunny and absolutely sweltering. We moved from dodgy hostel to hostel whch I suspect will be really LOUD! I am getting too old for this..or too spoiled. Whatever - Ireland B&B´s, here I come! Jen and I trekked to Park Guelle, which is this massive park with architecture by Gaudi - absolutely stunning...I have postcards to show everyone. Other than that we did a lot of wandering, got lost and did some other stuff..like eat and search for public washrooms.

As we were walking back to the hostel tonight, my arms broke out again!! I don´t know what it is - but the foam did the job again!! I hope this is a short term thing.

Anyways, one more day in Spain, then off to the Emerald Isle for some solo R&R.