Day 1 - Dublin

Picture of the day

Our flight left Dulles a little after 7pm EST. Dad got us to the airport in a timely manner so we had plenty of time to check in, get through security, eat a YUMMY Potbelly's sandwich (even though 2 dumb girls cut in front of me and took the last sugar cookie) and get on our flight. We flew Aer Lingus, an Irish airline, so everything & everyone was green! When we found our seats we realized that since mom and canceled her trip 3 days earlier that they likely hadn't rebooked her spot, my thoughts on it, if mom wasn't sitting next to me, no one was!!! I got to have the two seats to my self the entire flight over there, made for a comfy ride! The flight was uneventful. They played some decent movies, fed me some good chicken stuff, took a 20 minute snooze and got to play with a darling little girl named Erin.

We arrived at the Dublin airport at 7am local time, just in the nick of time to begin our only day in Dublin.

(Don't we still look great for having been up for more than 24 hours?!?!)

We got our luggage, found Dan Dooley rental car, found out that we had to buy insurance (lame-o!!!, apparently if it does not specifically say internationally covered, they refuse to give you your car), and got on the shuttle to go pick up our car. The next thirty minutes were hilarious to me, stressful to Erin I am sure. She had never driven on the left side of the road, nor had she ever driven on the right side of the car. She did a FANTASTIC job!!

With a little help from the GPS we made it to the Regency Hotel in Dublin, parked our car and got on the bus toward the City Center. I had never been on a city bus before so I had to document that momentous occasion!

Since it was about 4am body time at this point we decided to buy tickets for a hop-on-hop-off tour of Dublin. We rode the entire route on the top deck of a double-decker bus to see all the places we could go and then pick the ones that looked the most interesting. I will not lie, there were many-a-times where I could feel my head jerking because I was falling asleep, we got quite a few funny looks but at least it was all three of us! The places we decided to stop were Trinity College, the National Gallery, and Kilmainham Gaol.

Kilmainham Gaol was by far my favorite stop!!! This is an old jail that is tied to the history of Ireland, ask Erin for all the details! For a couple of euros we got to tour the entire jail, the chapel, the old cells (dark and closed off) and the new part which is built in a horseshoe shape so that everything could be heard everywhere and the guards to watch more prisoners at a time. They housed prisoners there as young as 5!!! honest to goodness, 5 years old. That is my little xavie going to jail for steeling bread for his family. sad! Our tour guide was honestly amazing. The last place we stopped on the tour of the jail was a courtyard which was secluded from the other courtyards and is where the leaders of the 1916 Uprising were executed. The tour guide pointed out the two crosses on either end of the courtyard. One was there because that is the spot where 11 of the 12 who had been executed were standing.

The other when marked the spot where the 12th, James Connolly, was sitting, strapped to a chair because we was so ill he could not even sit up straight let alone walk to the other end of the courtyard. I was so surprised when she told us that, rather than just let him die in the next day or two as he could have, they felt that they had to execute him for his part in the unsuccessful rebellion. Fascinating.

Following the tour we hopped on the bus, grabbed some grub at SuperMac's, went and shopped at the infamous Penney's, went back to SuperMac's for some treats and caught the bus back to our hotel. We got back about 7:45 and I am pretty sure Jordan was asleep by about 7:48 and Erin and I desperately tried to find a working internet source, both computers at the hotel were out so I passed out by about 8:30. Can't complain though, I never had jet lag!!!

Some more cool pictures from the day