Monday, January 26, 2009

Anarchy in the UK: Dublin

Ok, so Dublin's not actually the UK. Whatever.

Saturday, Jan. 3 - We got a bus down to Larne. We expected it to go straight to Belfast, since we hadn't had to switch buses on the way from Belfast, but we had to wait about half an hour at the Larne bus station. Oh well. There was an oddly nice young man, probably our age or younger, who told us we had to wait, where to get the next bus, and then when the bus actually got there, he helped us load our luggage. Then he was our only company on the back half of the bendy bus that took us back to Belfast. It was nice, but slightly odd. Other occurances on the ride? At some point we stopped for about ten minutes in some town to switch drivers. As we were waiting on the bus, this older gentleman came by, leading his pet goat by a chain. It was a tad unexpected, and kept us amused until the bus departed.

Once we got to Belfast, Erica and Alex ran to get in line for the bus to Dublin while I ran to the ticket counter to buy our tickets. I got the tickets right before Alex and Erica got to the bus door. Good timing. Then we embarked on the three hour bus ride down to Dublin. Basically I tried to read and sleep, but at some point my hypochondria kicked in and I was convinced that I couldn't talk. Honestly, though, I felt something wrong with my throat and had trouble talking for the next few hours. Not sure what it was, but it eventually went away. I had been ill since before I left for Istanbul, and I finally broke down and started taking my antibiotics while in Belfast.

Anyway, we got to the main bus station in Dublin. Alex found out where the bus to our hotel, the Travelodge Castleknock, was, but we ended up walking in circles around the bus station until he went back in, asked again, and realized that our bus left from O'Connell Street, about three blocks away. So we dragged our luggage up to O'Connell Street, and a very nice police officer helped us find our bus, count out exact change for the bus fare, and told the bus driver where we had to get off, since we didn't know where the stop for the Travelodge was.

Alex had said that the hotel advertised being only a couple of kilometers outside the city centre. And by a couple, they meant seven. So we were on the bus for about half an hour, and the bus driver didn't tell us where to get off, so based on our limited knowledge of the Dublin suburbs, we guessed. We saw the Travelodge sign on our right and got off at the next stop after that. It wasn't exactly close, and we had to cross a highway in order to get over towards the hotel. Then we checked in, got into our rooms, which were comfortable enough, but nothing special, and ate dinner at the Denny's-type restaurant next to the hotel. It was the only non-residential establishment nearby, and everyone who worked there looked like they hated their lives. Another early night. I think I watched National Treasure and read before going to bed.


Sunday, Jan. 4 - We woke up and ate handfuls of Frosties for breakfast (the same Frosties we had bought in Belfast). Then we set out to look for a closer bus stop than the one we had seen the previous night. But to use the Dublin buses, you need exact change, which we didn't have. Between the three of us, we had enough change for one one-way fare into the city centre. We asked at the hotel desk if they could give us change for a 5Euro bill, but the girl at the counter was thoroughly unhelpful. Then we went back to the Denny's-type place next door and asked if they could give us change, but, of course, they, too, were unhelpful. I asked some other travelers in the lobby of the hotel if they could break a 5, but none of them spoke English. Finally, desparing, we decided that I would take a bus into town, get change, and then come back for them. We headed off across the highway, back to the bus stop we had gotten off at the previous night, hoping maybe there would be a change machine. There wasn't. We despaired and cursed the unwholesome Dublin suburbs, and then decided to simply walk down the side of the highway toward Dublin until we came across something that looked like it could break a 5. The Dublin suburbs are not an attractive place. It was literally crappy, because at least once we had to step over dog droppings. Finally we saw a petrol station across the highway, darted across four lanes of traffic once again, and bought a couple things at the convenience store in order to have change. Then we went back across the highway, and waited at the nearest bus stop. Finally a bus came and we were on our way into Dublin.

We saw most of the main sights. Alex was a wonderful tour guide, remembering all the places he had been the last time he was in Dublin. We walked through Trinity College, but the Old Library wasn't open until noon, and the Book of Kells wasn't on display at all. So we walked over to the History and Archeology Museum, which wasn't open until 2. I'm not sure what we did in the meantime. At some point we walked through St. Stephen's Green, went to the Dublin Tourist Office, and walked to Grafton Street, Dublin's trendy shopping street. Then we went back to see Trinity's Old Library, which was amazing, as old libraries tend to be. From there we went to the Archeology Museum, which was a very good museum. I liked the exhibit on ritual sacrafice and bog bodies. We randomly ran into Erica's friend Tony from Durham. It was odd.

At some point we got bagels for lunch, which were delicious. Alex even admitted that they were a good choice. For some reason, there were a lot of bagel places in Dublin. This surprised me, since I was hard pressed to find a decent bagel anywhere in London or Norwich. We walked around some more.

All I really wanted to do in Dublin was go to a pub with live music. So we went over to Temple Bar, looked around, and found The Temple Bar, which boasted having live folk music later that night. But rather than be overcharged for pub food, we went to a fast food, takeout type place and ordered a pizza and curry fries. In a desperate move not to be British, the Irish say "fries" instead of "chips." I was skeptical at first, but curry sauce and cheese on fries is actually very good. Then we went to the pub, which was very crowded. Erica forced Alex to get something. So he and I each got a pint of Bulmers cider, and Erica got a Guinness. I'm not a fan of beer. Not even in Ireland. It was expensive, though. Six Euros for one pint! A good excuse not to drink in Ireland. I was on antibiotics, too, so I really shouldn't have been drinking anything, but I felt like I should have at least one pint in an Irish pub. We sat by the window and listened to the music, which was good. At one point Erica got a phone call from her mom, so she stepped outside. I caught Alex staring out the window at someone, and he told me he was watching this particular, somewhat dubious-looking guy who had been standing on the same street corner for the past fifteen minutes. I recognized him as the same guy I had seen pass by the window three times already. We spent the next half an hour coming up with stories about why he was waiting there. Eventually a woman came up to him, gestured like she had been held up in traffic or something, and then they left. He must have been waiting for over an hour.

After we had finished our drinks, we went back to O'Connell Street, making sure we had enough money for both the bus back that night and one back into town the next morning, and went back to Castleknock.

Monday, Jan. 4 - We woke up early, checked out, and waited at our new-found bus stop. We saw a bus approach, hailed it down, turned to pick up our bags, and by the time we had turned around the bus had left. Bastard. Eventually another one came by, but this time we were ready.

We got into town, rented lockers at the bus station, stored our bags, and went to walk around Christchurch and St. Patrick's Cathedrals. We were going to catch a ferry to Holyhead, Wales, later that night. Christchurch was interesting, but I didn't get the same sort of serene feeling that I usually get in cathedrals. Oh well. At St. Patrick's I randomly ran into Liza from the Norwich program. We hugged, I called Erica over, since they knew each other from DTG, and we took a couple of pictures before she left to go look around. We stayed there for a while, just sitting and looking. I think Erica fell asleep in one of the pews. When we got out of the cathedral the clouds in the sky had turned this incredible mixture of purple and pink, so we spent a good twenty minutes taking artistic pictures.


Then we went off to Grafton Street to find something to eat. Eventually we ended up at a mall on the end of Grafton Street, but not a normal mall. This one was very pretty and Victorian. Far nicer than an American mall. I called up Liza and she met us for dinner at the mall. We walked around a bit, and then she headed off back to her hostel, since it was getting dark and she was there alone. Erica, Alex, and I went back to the bus depot, got our bags, and got on the bus to the port. We were expecting a small car ferry, the kind of thing I once took across the Delaware. Instead, we were greeted with this enormous cruise ship! It was absolutely fantastic. We sat in one of several lounges, got a snack from the bar, and talked and took pictures for three hours while we sailed across the Irish Sea. We arrived in Holyhead around half past midnight, took a shuttle from the port to the station to collect our luggage, and then Alex, Erica, and I hailed a cab to take us to the most wonderful place on earth: The Boathouse Hotel.

1 comment:

Chad Frazier said...

It used to be in the UK. That is, till the Irish decided otherwise.