Our flight was 9:30 at night so we spent the morning taking garbage (romantic eh?) to Williston since our town garbage is every other week and between schedules and mud season we were a little overdue and di not want to leave it another week or two. So loaded the RAV with our luggage (and garbage) and stopped first in Williston ($20 worth!) and then south to go to Lebanon NH where we would get the bus to Boston. We do not like driving to Boston and the Darmouth Coach does a great job, nicely run outfit. We stopped for lunch at Red Hen Bakery in Middlesex (never been before) and it was great. Then a search around Lebanon for ice cream (we are on vacation you know) and finally found some in the Home Depot parking lot??
Bus was right on time and whisked us to the airport, right to the terminal. Those guys are great.
We had a few hours until our plane and between people watching and a couple of good books managed to kill the time nicely. We flew Delta, six hour flight direct to Dublin, and we got a real meal for dinner and a light breakfast even, just like in the 1970's! Nice job Delta.
We landed in Dublin, went through the non-EU customs que, got the luggage, then a Mazda 3, black with the steering wheel on the wrong side. A little larger car than I had hoped for (I would rent a go-cart if I could get one). The EuroCar guy was great. I slept some on the airplane but Deb did not get much sleep. I had downloaded Ireland on my offline Google Maps so we just punched in the hotel and Deb and the nice Google lady got us through pretty heavy traffic right to the hotel. Thank God for Google!!
I have driven on the wrong side before in Scotland years ago but starting in Dublin traffic as a warmup was completely crazy. Shift with the wrong hand, 6 speed manual, digital everything (and no idea what all those numbers on the dash was for), mirror in the wrong place, No tach and a quiet engine so no idea what gear I was in or supposed to be in (I found the tach two days later). Bu, no bumps or bruises and safe landing at the hotel. We decided to have an hour nap and then go hit the city.
After the nap we woke (Friday Apr 26), we walked, got our bearings and went to the Little Museum which was a quick and comedic history of Dublin. I still do not understand the history of Ireland / Northern Ireland / England and who dislikes who and who did what to who when, and it turns out, most of the people I talked to were not too clear either. More research required later.
Lunch at Tang which was kinda earth crunchy (just like home) but good stuff. Salads and wrap kinda things (that should narrow it down). The another little nap, and then we went to the Old Store House which had live music and Irish dancing (a young woman who danced and then sat at the bar over and over.). Guinness stew and shepard's pie, good hardy Irish fare. And pints of cider for the lady and good Irish beer for me. They have quite a lot of variety (and Guinness of course).
Finally it was late enough to really go to sleep for the night (Friday night).
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