“Lex Milburn’s studying abroad again?! Is she ever going to graduate?” A thought that may be running through many of your minds. It was not my original plan to study abroad again, I was planning on completing an internship this semester and graduating in May. However, there are several more internship opportunities available for my major during the summer, and my favorite professor that just recently retired from UNK, Marta Moorman is leading the trip! These factors combined with the fact I’m always itching for a new long term international adventure led to my decision to Study Abroad again in Ireland! This will push back my graduation until the end of the summer after I complete an internship with UNK’s Study Abroad office.
My favorite part of preparing for any trip is buying my plane ticket. As soon as I got my acceptance I was looking around for the best deal. I remembered a tip I learned: if you book your flight to Europe through IcelandAir, you can book a free stopover in Iceland. I ended up finding a round trip flight from Denver-Reykjavik for one week- Dublin for 3 months- back to Denver in May with bags and seat selection included for $550. After the plane was booked I told Nicole Mittman and Kylee Meyer about the deal and they happily hopped on board and decided to join me! Later on Ronald Gonzalez and Daniel Keeling decided to join as well.
After the flight was book my next step was obvious, choose a tattoo artist and set up an appointment! Our second day in Dublin I met with Camila Conti at Reinkarnated Tattoo Dublin and we spent the whole day together on my first color tattoo.
After booking my flight and tattoo appointment, my next big planning decision was how much luggage to bring. I’ve learned from experience that less is almost always better, however, I knew Ireland was going to be cold! Sweaters and coats can take up a lot of space. I decided I’d bring a small normal size backpack and the osprey pack I bought for the trip I took to Spain, Portugal, and Greece a few summers ago. Unfortunately, while searching for the pack, my mom realized it had been mistakenly sold at the last garage sale! That was definitely a disappointment, but I ended up buying a new Osprey pack that I like better because it’s not top loading. I’m proud that I was able to narrow everything down to the one checked bag and a carry on because traveling light is always so much easier. Last time I forgot to take one of Michael’s sweatshirts with me but we didn’t make the same mistake twice!
Another thing that I wish I would’ve taken on my last study abroad adventure were photos to hang in my room. Reading Kylee’s first blog post before we left was a great final reminder!
Our week in Iceland was truly incredible and breath taking! Nicole put together this video: https://youtu.be/p_881piUw5Y
Traveling Rays 