My Trip To Europe

We had an RUDE AWAKENING this morning, when Adele's alarm SYSTEM set off the radio unbelivably loud at like 6:30 in the morning! It was like we got haunted by THE SPIRIT OF RADIO! But anyways, we said goodbye, and we left to take the bus at O'Connell's street to get to the Dublin airport to get back HOME. But because, I got us late for the bus, my dad had a complete PANIC ATTACK! But, he settled down, and we got to go on another bus, so we got to the airport eventually. When we got to the airport, we were extremely annoyed by how we it took them forever to get us to sign in, because of the 'high terror alert' in Europe. They must have asked us at least 50 times "Did you pack these bags?" "Do you know all the contents of these bags?". But, we finally got on our plane from Dublin to Philadelphia. It was a very long flight. It was seven hours long, and because of the jet lag I felt like it was 2 A.M.! Fortunatly, they were playing a good movie this time on the plane - Grown Ups with Adam Sandler. It was funny. Anyways, I felt FINALLY FREE when we got to Philidelphia and got off the plane. But then, we had to go through more customs and stuff, until we finally hate to wait for the plane to come. It was delayed by 45 minutes. So, I decided to get a delicous bacon-cheese burger, and I also bought a "Guitar World" magazine I saw there. Some articles it had was an interview with Jimmy Paige (of LED ZEPPELIN) about the 40th anniversary of the underrated 1970 album LED ZEPPELIN III; an article of the making of PINK FLOYD's album THE WALL; and an interview with CARLOS SANTANA about his new album of covers by LED ZEPPELIN, THE ROLLING STONES, CREAM, THE BEATLES, AC/DC, DEEP PURPLE, JIMI HENDRIX and several others. And, unfortunatley, my dad made me do my homework. Oh well, at least I had it all finished, and it's no longer SOMETHING IN THE WAY. Anyways, our plane finally arrived and took us to Ottawa several minutes before planned arrival. Oh well, better early than late. Well, anyways, we arrived at the airport, and my MOTHER and Alyssa, my sister,had picked us up around 6:00 (SIX O'CLOCK). Oh well, we came home, and everyone missed us, especially Willow, my little puppy who I think is cuter than every other ONE of the DOGS. Anyways, when we got back my dad was excited that SUPPER'S READY, however I wasn't hungry. I would've rather stayed in my room to listen to ÆNIMA, CARESS OF STEEL, HEMISPHERES, MASTER OF PUPPETS, MOVING PICTURES, SEVENTH SON OF A SEVENTH SON, SOMEWHERE BACK IN TIME, THE NUMBER OF THE BEAST and VIRTUAL XI: the CDs I had purchased on my trip. I was just getting used to the Jet Lag, but I'm back in Canada, so now I have to get used to it again. I probably won't get any sleep until it's like 2 MINUTES TO MIDNIGHT tonight. Oh, well, I guess my trips ends here. See ya later!

Guess this sort of went FULL CIRCLE, in fact A PERFECT CIRCLE if you will!

Today, we woke up very early at 7 AM to get on the airplane back to Dublin. Before we got on the plane though, my dad gave the car we rented back to the guy we rented it from. Then, we went to the plane to get back to Dublin. When we got back, we went on the "Viking Splash Tours", which is basically your average bus tours of the city- except you got to wear viking hats and you got to shout at people on the streets when they weren't paying attention. We went all over town and saw everything there from the town hall, to the churches, to the studio where Irish rock band U2 recorded all of their studio albums (with the exception of 1991's Achtung Baby, which was recorded in Berlin). Our tour guide made a lot of jokes about U2. One was "What is the difference between Bono and Jesus Christ?...Jesus never thought he was Bono!". Then, after the tour we went and saw my great-aunt and uncle Gwen and Leslie, and their children my aunt Adele and my uncle Leslie, Jr and his two little kids. We had a great time with them. Then, we stayed at Adele's apartment for the night while we packed up for tomorrow. This is my 2nd-to-last post, then I'm going to be finished with my blog.

Today, we left our small hotel and drove back to Porto. And the way back, we stopped at the town of Tomar where the head of the Knights Templar was in the middle ages. Besides that, our ride back was mostly uneventful. When we finally got to Porto, we went to a hotel where we will only be staying for one night, as tomorrow we will have to wake up at 7 AM to get to the airport. Our trip's almost over!

Today, was the first only day of our trip that it rained. But boy, DID IT RAIN!!! I got woken up at 5 AM (which felt like midnight, because of the jet lag) because the extremely loud winds and rain. Then, after breakfest, my dad took me to the Alcobaça Monastery which had the tombs of King Pedro I of Portugal and his declared wife Inês de Castro, who was assasinated by the order of Pedro's father (who feared for her influence over his son's kingdom, as her country of birth, Spain, was involved in a civil war at the time, so he didn't want Portugal to be involved). Then, after that, me and my dad went to a tour of some mind-boggling caves underneath Portugal. But guess what?...WE FORGOT THE CAMERA AGAIN! Then, if that wasn't enough for one day, my dad also took me to the town of Fátima, where in the 1940's several thousand people claimed they saw an apparition of the Virgin Mary. As you could guess, everywhere we went there we people selling Jesus and Virgin Mary statues and merchandise. Then, we came back to the beach...and the waves were EVEN BIGGER than yesterday! And as you could guess, we swam in them! Then, we came back and had supper at a sandwich place, because our favorite resturant was closed! This is our last day here, so tomorrow, we are returning to Porto.

Today, after we woke up, even though the waves were humongous, we crazy Canadians went to the beach at Peniche and swam in the water. I drove my dad crazy trying to climb on the dangerous rocks above the waves with my bare feet. Then, later during the day, we went to the walled city of Obidos, where we got ot walk on the walls surrounding the city. However, we forgot to bring the camera, so we unfortunatly have absolutely no photos of the city. Oh well. But at least go to have some delicous octopus for dinner!