Happy Birthday to one of my oldest and dearest friends and my travel partner! For her birthday we decided to head out of the country yet again because we clearly don't care about savings...or our future, but that's beside the point.
Out of all the warm, tropical, and scenic places we could have gone, we went to Dublin. "Why?" You may ask, we have no clue, it seemed like a cool place and the tickets were cheap. This time, we didn't use Groupon and opted to book our own travel through Expedia. Using Expedia is a great idea because you can customize your trip a hell of a lot better than going through a Groupon travel agency. The overall cost of the trip which included airfare and a hostel was around $575. Now, keep in mind before you get excited that the pricing for this is mainly due to the fact that this isn't a peak tourist time for Dublin as it is cold. We also left right at Thanksgiving, and they don't celebrate this holiday of course. We bought our trip in late October so this left us very little time to prepare and let's just say we were feeling very drained in the pockets, but we were determined to make it work. One thing that I really wanted to teach myself, is how to travel last minute and not be such a planner! It is in my nature to do so, and I was hoping that by buying a last minute trip, I could learn to just go with the flow like my good friend! So this time, I let Sygic plan for me, didn't buy any tickets in advance, and just winged it! This lack of planning was well worth it because we were allowed to be spontaneous and didn't have to visit by a rigid schedule which was nice. If I had to choose planning or not planning, I would say that both have their risks, but I like to at least have an idea of what I'm doing.
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Yes, that is a man driving on the opposite side of the car. I've seen cars like this before, but I've never driven in one and I don't particularly like it as it is a bit startling. After landing, we navigated through the airport and the EXTREMELY long customs line to make it curbside where we could decide how we wanted to get to our hostel. Before coming to Dublin, I had done a little research on how we would get around, and from what I found, private Uber drivers aren't a thing. What actually happens when you use Uber here is that it calls a taxi service for you. Luckily, since everything is fairly close when you get to the city center you don't have to use it often, but if you DO need a taxi, I would suggest downloading the MyTaxi app ahead of time. This app allows you to use it in most of Europe and works JUST like Uber, if not better! It calls a taxi for you, lets you choose whether you want to pay cash upon arrival or with card, AND you can split payments as well! Using a taxi to get around Dublin is fairly cheap and once we made it to the city, we didn't spend more than 15 euros a ride to get anywhere. So if you spent all day walking Temple Bar and simply can't do it anymore, flip your phone out (if you have that Sprint unlimited plan, which worked swimmingly in Dublin. I had full service!) and call your taxi! I would say though (if you are planning on bringing and using your phone) be sure to bring an extra charger or portable charger, for some reason, my phone was zapped and devoid of power very quickly here while it searched for service. It isn't hard to survive without a phone here, since everything is close, but it comes in handy. We arrived at Isaac's Hostel on Frenchman's lane in Dublin, which sits pretty much in an alley, but it's really cute and full of character. This was our first time staying in a hostel and we really didn't know what to expect. When we first arrived, we were greeted by a cozy scene reminiscent of summer camp. They had a lot of solid wooden furniture to sit on and a cute potbelly stove that really warmed up the lobby. Since check-in wasn't until 2pm, we were given locks to keep our things downstairs in storage. The front desk gentlemen were very accommodating and even showed us a bathroom we could use in the basement to freshen up if we needed it! As creepy as that may sound, it was pretty nice to know that we now had a place we could escape to and shower/dress in peace. The only weird part about all of this (weird to US at least, since we had never stayed in a foreign hostel) was that the hot water had to be "summoned" in a way. Basically, we had to pump hot water from the sink while also simultaneously pumping the shower lever at the same time. The entire process took about 10 minutes before you could have a steaming hot shower. Then, while IN the shower you would have to periodically pump the lever IN the shower to keep the water on. Needless to say, getting ready every day would prove to be a challenge... Anyways, after the long and arduous process of getting ready. We decided to first stop at The Spire, or as our very entertaining taxi driver called it "The Stiletto of the Ghetto". This insanely tall spike in the ground is the work of a commissioned artist who spent a lot of taxpayer dollars to make it, and we tourists love a good waste of money so we had to see it. This landmark became an integral part of our trip as it was just tall enough to help us navigate where we were at any given time...drunk or sober. The area surrounding The Spire had a lot of different food and shopping spots. This made it easy to find food on the go since we were starving by this time. Much like our trip to Prague, a taste for Mexican food manifested itself and we couldn't get it out of our heads to have some. I found a place called "Saburritos", which is like Chipotle...but with significantly less flavor. One good thing I will say, is that the produce was fresh, always a good sign. After we finished eating, we made our way past the Spire, down Henry Street which had plenty of shopping and stores that we don't have in America. Walking down Henry Street proved to be a bit strange as my friend and I were gawked at as if no one had seen brown before. It was a bit off-putting and certainly wouldn't be the last time on this trip, but we tried to brush it off. We had never had any ISSUES whilst traveling before due to our race, and didn't expect Dublin to be the place, but we definitely were faced with a bit of a chilly welcome when speaking to locals. We next made our way to The Custom House, a government building designed in neoclassical fashion. It's possible to get a tour of the inside, but we decided to pass as we were beat and had other things we wanted to check out, like Saint Patrick's Cathedral. As we walked to the cathedral, it was impossible to ignore the gorgeous architecture of the city and the many bridges that connect one part of the city to another. This was much like Prague, each side of the bridge presents a very different type of lifestyle (ex. pubs and nightlife are more to the North of the city, and a bridge can be crossed to reach them!). Also, notice the picture below of me on the bridge and how it looks to be late afternoon? Yes. This picture was taken at 2:30pm, if you do go to Dublin in the winter months, keep in mind that you won't have a lot of daylight hours and plan accordingly! I would say by about 4pm, the sun would start to set, which isn't that bad because if you rise early, you can hit all of the tourist spots on foot since the city isn't too large. |
Ireland 2018A trip to Ireland in November of 2018 ArchivesCategories |