June 26-"Congratulations, it's a food baby!"

This has been the perfect day--and the night is young yet! We woke up this morning and headed into town to check out an open air market we'd heard about from various guidebooks and local Galwegians.

It. Was. Incredible.

There was a whole street filled with vendors selling various crafts and food. Everything from cheese to handwoven bags to original artworks was on display and up for sale. The crafts were pretty and all, but we were really there for the food. We sampled donuts from the famous donut stand, almond-coconut-orange cake (gluten-free!), and crepes that were out of this world. The beautiful crepe cart had a ton of options on its menu--I myself got a crepe with vanilla sugar, butter, and lemon, so delicious! My only complaint would be that they didn't make the crepes right in front of you with the windshield-wiper thing, like they do at the crepe place in Philly, but the crepe itself was superb. After walking through the market several times, we decided that we needed a coffee break. We stopped by a bakery right on Shop Street, where I ordered a hot chocolate. The girl working asked if I wanted whipped cream and marshmellows and I of course said yes, thinking it would be a little dollop of whipped cream and a sprinkling of marshmellows--Oh no. This was like if you replicated the iceberg that sunk the Titantic in whipped cream and set it down in an ocean of hot chocolately perfection with some gooey marshmellows floating underneath like sharks on the prowl. I know that is the weirdest sentence I will probably ever write on this blog, but that's what I was thinking as I drank it, so it will be immortalized here in cyberspace. Strange description aside, it was the most epic cup of hot chocolate I've ever had. The only problem with this wonderful morning? We all were now sporting pretty impressive food babies, so we decided to explore a little as we walked off at least some of our calorie binge. We couldn't escape the food for long though, as our wandering took us past some pretty amazing bakeries. We physically couldn't eat anymore, but my "Things to do in Galway" list has grown pretty substantially. My companions returned to their homestay after awhile to take a much needed nap, but I continued to wander around. I found a bunch of used bookshops, which I have an almost unhealthy obsession with. I am trying to resist the urge to buy books, since I'd have to lug them back to the States, but I wrote down some titles to check out at the library. My wanderings led me out of the main downtown area and toward the beach, where I enjoyed a nice walk around the coast and into the Salthill area. Apparently there are some good beaches farther down, so I'll have to plan a beach day sometime soon.

The day was complete with a trip to the King's Head to watch USA take on Ghana in the first round of World Cup. The game itself was almost as painful as watching Villanova in the tournament this year, but there were a lot of US supporters in the pub to take the edge off. There was a rousing chorus of "Que sera, sera" towards the end. We did see quite a few hen parties in progress on our way home, so that was at least entertaining.