So Here's the Plan...

8 weeks from yesterday I will be boarding a plane and this adventure will officially begin. Here is the plan:

Erin, my roommate for the past year and a half, and I will fly to Prague, spend a few days there, and then continue on to Munich, Vienna, Salzburg, Cinque Terre, and finally Rome, arriving the day before Erin needs to be there to start her semester studying in Rome and Greece. From there I will fly to Dublin and find my way to Galway to start my program on September 1st!

Even before I started college I knew that I for sure wanted to spend a semester abroad. I found out in February that I got accepted to the Galway program, and since then haven't been able to wait for it to begin. Soon after that Erin and I started talking about traveling together before our programs started, and spent many nights this past semester making plans while procrastinating studying. Until recently we only had a general idea of what our itinerary would look like, but after researching hostels and buying a Eurail pass this past week, we now have a pretty good idea of what this 18-day trip will consist of. I've spent so much time thinking about all the places we're going to visit in August that I sometimes forget that there's a whole semester in Ireland happening after that!

So now it just feels like there is a lot of preparing to do. The idea of packing for almost four months, where the weather will range from hot and sunny to rainy and cold, seriously stresses me out. Packing light is not a talent of mine, but I will have to learn!

Thanks to those who have visited this blog or will in the future! My goal is to keep my family and friends at home updated throughout my semester in a more personal way than just clicking through a Facebook album of photos. But I am also doing it for myself, as just another way to preserve some of the many memories that will be created during my time abroad, and to have something to look back on when it's over. Keep checking back throughout the coming months for updates!

Until next time,
Slán go fóill
(That's "Goodbye for now" in Gaelic! )

(Out the airplane window, a photo by tudydamian on Flickr.)