We flew out of Newark at about 7 PM, Saturday. The flight is only about 7 hours, but Ireland is 5 hours ahead of the East coast. This means that we arrived just before 7 AM local time, after having about 2 or 3 hours of sleep. This was the only flight that I can remember that included two meals, dinner and breakfast, even though they were served about 4 hours apart.
Once we managed to find our luggage and get through customs (alarmingly easy), we went and fetched our rental car.
I'd never driven a Hyundai before, so this was a treat. Obviously, I had some trouble getting into this plastic box on wheels. I had also never driven stick with the stick shift on the left before, which was another treat. Same goes for driving on the left side of the road. (This was pointed out several times via signage).
The habit of driving on the right is a very tough one to break. While in the parking lot, we came upon another car (who happened to be entering an exit-only part of the lot), and my instinct was to dodge to the right, which wasn't a great idea.
So, it's about 7 AM, we're at the Dublin airport with nothing but a hotel address and a map. After about an hour of driving around while being yelled at ("left! left!", "you're drifting into the other lane!", "LEFT", etc), we made it to the hotel parking garage. This should probably have been less than 30 minutes, but the traffic patterns are confusing, with lots of one-way streets, turn-only lanes, etc. Luckily it was 7 AM on a Sunday, so not many people were out. One of the most stressful hours in recent memory, anyway.
Thankfully, the hotel had the room ready at 8:30 AM and we were able to go take a nap. The hotel is ridiculous. The turn down service includes bathrobs, slippers, bottled water, wine, chocolates, etc.
After a few hours of sleeping, we got up and ventured forth for food and drink.
It is very difficult to not get hit by cars, because they are coming from unexpected directions. Thankfully, they seem to have thought of that, and, if you are actually in a crosswalk, there are helpful reminders painted on the road.
While we were out, it was cloudy and raining sometimes. This didn't seem to be unusual, as a lot of people had umbrellas, and many didn't even seem to notice that it was raining.
Eventually, it cleared up, as you can see in this picture of St. Patrick's Cathedral.
Which is, of course, brought to you by Bailey's Irish Cream.
The Irish aren't much better at obeying signs than we are, really. Also, American beers seem to be heavily advertised here, which is odd, since a pint of Bud costs more than a pint of Guinness.
We also had to sample the Bailey's and Harp, naturally.
We're so far North that sunset is at about 10 PM. Sunrise is 5 AM... so that's 17 hours of daylight. It's a little bit ridiculous. Oh, and it's nice and cold, too.
There are plenty more pictures in the official Ireland 2007 photo gallery if you're really interested.
I'll try to update this again when and if we have free internet connections.
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