I Shoulda Stopped Them and Gave Them My Address!
And it’s back to the motherland for this Irishman!
I woke up at 1:45 this morning. That sucked. Setting an alarm for 3 AM was bad enough but even earlier was worse. We walked to the bus stop after we finally found out which one to use and got to the airport with plenty of spare time. It’s a good thing we had that extra time between trying to find the correct bus stop and wandering through the mind-boggling experience of navigating Schiphol Airport.
We have to go through customs in each place we go, asking about our travels and our plans and getting our passport stamped. I have dealt with crossings in Canada travel before but this has been different. They were much nicer than the local experiences I have had coming back into the U.S. coming into Ireland this morning the guy saw my name and asked why I didn’t have a green passport!
The people in Dublin have been so friendly and helpful and it isn’t probably one of the friendliest places I have ever visited. We try to figure out the public transit and someone will most generally ask if we need help and where we are going then they point us in the right direction. We are good about figuring the routes out but some of the buses and trains are not labeled very well. We have it figured out enough to get us to places we need to go, and a big “thank you” to the nice people of Dublin for helping us out!
We found our hotel but our room wasn’t ready yet so we left our bags at the front desk and got back on the train into downtown so we could look around. It’s not quite as hustle and bustle as Amsterdam but still there were many people out on this Saturday. In contrast, Amsterdam at 4 AM is crazy. People still walking around and riding bikes just like it was the middle of the day.
We got some lunch much at a little place on a canal. It was pretty good and different. We have been averaging about six miles a day walking, and we’re pretty worn out today. We came back to the hotel and decided to finally rest up while we could. We went to the restaurant here in the Sheldon Hotel and I finally got to try something they call “mushy peas”. They were actually very good, and I don’t like peas cooked. I also had fish and chips; it was chips and one piece of fish which was enormous. Well worth the €15.
The Lobby of Our Hotel in Dublin, Ireland
It’s bedtime now and we can get a good eight hours of sleep before we need to catch a train to our next destination. We needed to spend more time here and it’s frustrating that we couldn’t but we needed to rest our bodies tonight. I know I’ll be coming back soon.
Keep checking back!
