Dublin

Our trip to Dublin began early on a Monday morning, wet, cold and miserable. Each train we were catching ended up being delayed for one reason or another. This meant that we ended up missing our 2pm ferry out of Holyhead in Wales and also missed catching up with Ilona's Grandpa. 

Passing through the station of the second longest place name in the world (after Taumata­whakatangihanga­koauau­o­tamatea­turi­pukakapiki­maunga­horo­nuku­pokai­whenua­kitanatahu in New Zealand)

We managed to catch the 5pm ferry out of Holyhead, but it was on a smaller boat, which did very little to quell the motion of the ocean, and it's effects on my stomach. After 2.5 hours sitting dead still and staring straight ahead, we got to Dublin, where it was just as wet as it was in Britain. We found our hostel, and the four of us went out for tea, where I had the most AMAZING caramelised chilli banana, bacon and sweet potato burger with goats cheese (the place was called Jo'Burger for anyone interested). It was truly a landmark moment for me, much to the chagrin of Ilona.

Cool sculpture at Trinity College

 Over the week, we took in Trinity College, the Book of Kells, which is the oldest intact book known to man, bog men in the natural history museum, some Guinness, a cemetery, botanic gardens, the Guinness Storehouse and some more Guinness. 

So much for getting out of the bar trade...

 Most notably, on Wednesday night we went to see The Dubliners, which was an adaptation of James Joyce's collection of short stories of the same name. I had never read, nor heard of James Joyce before but came away from the play wanting to read more. Alison was so tired from our day that she had to head home at the interval, but even I started to droop a bit towards the end as it was so long.

View from the cliffs in Howth

On Thursday morning we took the train out to Howth and had a nice walk around the cliffs there. Howth is only 30 mins out by train (technically still a suburb of Dublin) and very fishing orientated. The area itself is very beautiful and the summit of Ben Howth gives great views back across to Dublin. Back in Dublin in the afternoon, we took a walk around the Temple Bar area. It was Arthur's day, so the streets were filled with jolly tourists and Dubliners alike, all partaking in the celebration and consumption of all things Guinness.

Inside the panopticon at Kilmainham Gaol

We ended our last day with a really good meal out at a Thai/Vietnamese restaurant where yet again, I mmmmm'ed and 'oh god this is good'ed through my meal.

Row and Alison left to catch the ferry back to Wales early on Friday morning, leaving Ilona and I to visit the Kilmainham Gaol and museum, which turned out to be really interesting. 

We wrapped up Ireland with a bit of a wander around some streets we hadn't wandered, then took a bus to the airport and onto a plane to Budapest, ready for the adventures awaiting us!

The 80th

After sad good byes in Edinburgh we headed down to Ulverston at the bottom of the Lake District for my Grandmas 80th Birthday family get together.

The weekend started off with a big family dinner and three different birthday cakes!

We had a typical Jepson family weekend, filled with walks, discussions, cold picnics and for a brave few, a freezing swim.

Amazingly all fourteen of us survived the weekend and there were only a few tears.

Me and Mike said our good byes to everyone and then we began our trip to Dublin with Mum and Row.

Leaving Edinburgh.

We've only called Edinburgh home for the past year and a bit, but in that time, it has become more than that. We've both grown up so much, met awesome new people, learned new skills, developed new passions and discovered so much about ourselves that we never could have done back home. Needless to say, our last week was very emotional. There were a lot of goodbyes; to friends, family, places and rituals alike.

St Andrews Monument; a familiar sight on Princes St, now resigned to our memory as a landmark of Edinburgh.

Ilona and I also had a very indulgent last week, meeting friends for lunches, dinners, drinks or coffee every day. We also had a stressful time trying to pack all of our things we had accumulated over the past year into as few shipping boxes as possible. A massive culling of a years worth of tat commenced and at the end of it all, we still had 4 big boxes of stuff to be shipped back to New Zealand, though thankfully at a decent price.
Our second to last day was very hectic, as we tried to cram in everything we hadn't got round to over the past week on a day where the heavens had opened, prompting us to frequently exclaim how glad we were to be travelling to somewhere with better weather.

The view from our bedroom in Porty, Edinburgh sending us off with style.

However on our last day, Edinburgh laid out it's finest weather to send us off. Ilona and I had breakfast at our favourite cafe in Porty, then packed up the rest of our stuff and said goodbye one last time, heading south to Ulverston in the Lakes District for Ilona's Grandma's 80th birthday gathering. We're both very sad to have left, but the next phase of our lives has begun!