Well, here we are in Dublin, Ireland! Here is a recap of the past few days – sorry for the gap…wifi is impossible to come by for free, sigh. Here is the recap from the past few days:
June 19th: We slept in until noon! Our bodies were still adjusting to the time change, not to mention completely worn out from all the walking the previous day. We got up, hit a local pub for lunch (steak and onion sandwich and a BLT, along with hot apple pie and warm chocolate pudding for dessert) and headed out for museums (which were free!!!!!!). We got on the tube like pros and got off at South Kensington Station. Oh yeah, over here the exit signs say “way out” instead. We first went to the Natural History Museum where we saw an impressive dinosaur display. That was the most impressive. The rest were just mammals and rocks, etc. The building was beautiful, though! Next we walked down the street to the Science Museum. We only wandered in the space section (saw some old, huge mega – computers!) After we were kicked out of the museum (it was closing time, haha!) we hopped back on the tube to Sloane Square for some shopping. This was a fancy shopping district with very high end stores that were way out of our price range, but fun to wander and people watch nonetheless. Next, we hopped the tube once more to go see Buckingham Palace. We saw it, although there were none of those crazy looking guards outside (there were guards, but dressed in regular clothes – bummer!). St. James’s park (and yes, the apostrophe “s” is supposed to be that way) is right next to the palace and very beautiful, so we couldn’t resist a stroll through it. There is a lake in the middle which offers some stunning photo opportunities. By now it was starting to get well into the evening. Another weird thing here is that it stays light really late. It’s 11:00pm right now and it is still in the twilight phase of the sunset here. Crazy!!! So we found a pub right next to the tube station and ordered some food and ale. I have to say it was the best food so far for me. I ordered a steak and potoato pie with mash and peas. It was delicious!! Whoever says that English food is bland doesn’t have tastebuds. I also ordered some authentic English Ale called Red Speckled Hen. Funny name, eh? Finally, rode the subway back to Earls court, and went to the internet cafe to print off documents needed for today’s traveling. Went back to the hotel for a much needed night of sleep. Whew!
June 20th (today) Ugh. I won’t even get into our unpleasantries we experienced today. All I can say is avoid any U.K. airport at all costs!!!!! It wasn’t horrible, but it made for a very long day. Once we got to Ireland, all was fine. We rode a bus to our hotel, which is very nice. Showered, bought some wifi access (yes, had to pay!) and set off to find food. That was tougher than it seems, as most of the pubs stop serving food at 8 pm. Again, that throws us off b/c it seems like it is 5 pm b/c it is so sunny and light outside for so late! So we walked a couple of miles checking here and there and finally ended up at….TGI Friday’s. I know, I know! But it was that or Burger King, seriously! We’ll hit the pubs tomorrow for lunch :P And the prices here are crazy. We thought London was bad, but here it is even worse. Let’s just say a burger costs about $20!!!!! Hopefully, prices will lessen as we hit smaller towns. So far, Dublin doesn’t feel very “Irish” and it’s a lot dirtier than London (which was very clean!!). The people are friendly enough, although we are hit up every block by homeless beggars. We are here in Dublin for another night and then we pick up our rental car. Tomorrow we hope to be able to rent some bikes so we can give our feet a break. I really want to go to the Guinness Storehouse (the brewery isn’t open to the public), the Jameson Distillery, and who knows what else. Just explore the city, I guess.
We’ve uploaded more pics, so keep checking our flickr!