Croagh Patrick

Today we traveled out to Croagh Patrick in Mayo County, Ireland. Asked everyone in my last post to cross your fingers for good weather...and it happened. Taxi driver said it's been nothing but rain past few days so we really lucked out. Just uploaded the pictures...I took 120 of them. I swear it wasn't just me though. Twelve of us went, and I did most of the climb with 2 guys - one from SJU another from Marquette. The whole way we kept pulling out our cameras saying "I know I've taken this picture before but I can't help it". It was just...amazing.

So a little about Croagh Patrick I suppose. It's the mountain where St. Patrick supposedly fasted for 40 days during Advent and cast the snakes out of Ireland. Oh, and it's 2,500 ft. in the air (Dad, I was 3rd one to the top...how surprised are you? haha) They say it takes about 3 hours to scale and 2 hours to descend. The 3 of us did the entire thing in 3. Wooo..my legs hurt so bad right now I deserve to brag a little bit haha.

Like I mentioned, I took soooo many pictures, so, sorry if I kind of go overboard posting them here.

Here's the mountain from the parking lot.

Statue of St. Patrick with mountain in background...

This was the "first leg", and it was like this the whole way through the first part. Slightly inclined, tons of rocks and a lot of slipping...

Here's the view at the top of the "first tier"...That's the town of Westport in the distance...

This is coming to the end of the "Second Tier"...that part was mostly a bunch of up and downs but without as much loose gravel and rock...Here's looking up Croagh Patrick and the "Third Tier"...

This is a little ways up the "Third Tier"...there were points we were on all four grabbing a hold of rocks above us for support, as you can kind of see here...very steep...was a pain coming down because all the rocks would kick out from underneath you...quads, knees and feet are killing me after the decline haha...

Here's a view of where we had just come across...most of what you can see is that "Second Tier", so again, mostly flat...was a nice break...

And finally we're at the top...here's most of our group sitting on the edge and grabbing our lunches...the view was awesome...photos really can't do it justice...

So, there was just a small portion of the photos...I tried to limit them! Back to school on Monday...hopefully something comes up to blog about in the meantime, but until then...

Hope all's well.
Cheers.

Luke