day 23!

Day 23! – this one was pretty tiring. I awoke from my nice double bed around 8am (I don’t know how I managed to get a whole double bed to myself, but anyways). We left Cong and made our way to Westport – a small town right on a bay on the west coast. Once we were there, a few of us (myself included) got dropped off at Croagh Patrick Mountain to do a bit of hiking. The summit was only 2,500 ft. (they don’t have any big mountains in Ireland), but it was a workout. There we a bunch of small rocks everywhere so I was slipping all over the place. It had some really nice views over the bay though so that was nice. I made it up to the top in about an hour and 15 minutes or so. Apparently this mountain was allegedly climbed by St. Patrick so it has become another major pilgrimage spot for people all over the country. They had a church at the top and all sorts of weird things where u had to walk in a circle 7 times while saying hail marys or something ridiculous like that. I even saw a guy climbing the mountain barefoot. After making my way back down I bought a sandwich for lunch and got back on the bus. We drove for about 45 minutes more to a small town in the middle of Connemara county and had a quick photo stop before moving on to Galway. Once we arrived in Galway. We all went out to a pub for dinner and got some realllly good food (but kinda expensive). Afterward I walked around the city a bit and got some pictures before making it back to the hostel for a nice early night.


ashford castle near our hostel in cong



view of the bay near westport from the mountain


u
me on the way up the mountain



summit of croagh patrick mountain (with the church in the distance)



me at the summit



crazy barefoot guy hiking the mountain



galway