 Dublin's famous Temple Bar |
WARNING: This is going to be a long post. Okay, jeez, where to begin? The last 48 hours have been crazy! The plane from Orlando to Chicago, and Chicago to London were great. No turbulence, and I was able to switch seats on the London flight. Still economy class, but with a window and no neighbor to share with - score! The layover at Heathrow, however, was hell to put it nicely. We arrived in London around 10:50 local time and the airport was closed. So I had to go through immigration in order to access the 'open' part of the airport. Once there, I found a seat and... sat for 8 hours - until the gates for Aer Lingus opened. The Wi-Fi at Heathrow isn't free, and isn't cheap either. Like £2 (approx. 4 USD) for 10 minutes of use, so I opted out. Ended up watching Chronicle and This Means War on my iPad. The flight from London to Dublin was quick, 55 minutes, and rainy. Non-EU citizen immigration in Dublin took longer than the flight however, with a lady in-front of me puking into a bag for about 1/3 of the time - lovely. After that I picked up my bag from baggage claim, found my way out of the airport and to the 16A bus stop. Conveniently, the bus stop was situated outside under a little sheet of cover. By the time I got there about 20 or so people where already huddled under the cover. I tried my best to squeeze in, but to no avail. So, I stood for about 20 minutes in the miserable drizzle and chilly wind until the bus finally came. Paid my €2,65 bus fare, went up to the top level, and plopped not-so-elequently down on the first open seat I saw. By this time my thinking was: forget the tour, I'm going straight to my hostel, checking in, and sleeping until tomorrow. That plan lasted for about 5 minutes until I asked a girl to the right of me which stop was O'Connell Street, she didn't know, but said she was getting off there as well. This sparked a conversation, in which I found out she was on the last leg of her trip through Europe (spending the first few months studying abroad in France and then traveling the remainder before she returned home to New York on Thursday). Since I hadn't made a reservation (because they didn't accept my credit card, so I was going to pay in cash) at the Times Hostel where I had planned on staying, she invited me to come with her to the hostel she had booked - Abigails (Awh, and now I miss my puppy - Mom, you better be nice to her!). We checked in, chatted with some girls who were on their way out and home (back to Boston and Idaho), and then set off on that free walking tour I had originally planned on doing.
Our tour guide, Cormac, was great and funny and he made the 4.5 hour tour really enjoyable. The weather was on and off, sunny and pouring, the whole time. Which he pointed out was the usual in Dublin, until about June and July when it just rains all the time. Gladly, my hair withstood - which was my main concern. The tour took us to about every historical and notable site in Dublin, and he was really informative about all of them. I learned that the Ha'Penny Bridge (which is in front of my Hostel, and crosses the Liffey) was named so because it used to cost half a penny to cross. Of course, now it's free. Interesting enough, the bridge was was built by the same guy who built the Titanic! Cormac, who is originally from Belfast in North Ireland, has only been living in Dublin for the last 3 years. Since he's Catholic, however, I guess he identifies more with the Republic of Ireland as opposed to North Ireland. Anyways, if you ask him, it's not Harland and Wolff's fault that the Titanic sunk, it is, "the idiot British captain's fault!" So with that, let me tell you that the Irish people HATE being associated in any way with the British.
The rest of the tour went by pretty fast. I learned a lot of interesting things, too much to type and probably more than anybody would be interested in reading, so I'll leave those to myself. After the tour, to say I was exhausted would be a complete understatement. Me and Naromie (the New Yorker) went back to our rooms and crashed. I slept from 6:00PM unit 9:30AM, and missed my tour to Giant's Causeway. I'll do that tomorrow..
Nothing much exciting happened today. Woke up and enjoyed the free breakfast the hostel gives. Just my kind of breakfast too: Cocoa pebbles, yogurt, fruit, boiled eggs, and some OJ. Not too shabby and all you can eat. Definitely saved me some euros. Then, Naromie, Daniella (our other roommate from Milan, Italy), and myself explored the city a bit, got some ice-cream (even though its freezing outside!), and stopped by the market for cooking supplies. My mother would love the markets here, everything is fresh and organic. Oddly, though, they don't refrigerate their eggs. Hmm.
Well, I guess that's all for now - I'm off to cook some spaghetti with an Italian!
I'll try to get some pictures posted soon. Laura comes on Thursday!
Love,
Bianca
