Travel and day 1

Photos are annoyingly in the wrong order. I don't know why?

But the day has finally come! Ireland trip! We had a nice FHE the night before and had a family dinner. Hannah also went on an afternoon date with Sawyer. Papa and Dad gave the travelers blessings, which were so awesome and such a comfort.

We got up early on Tuesday and began our never ending day of travel. It was drive to the airport, fly to Philly, change planes and fly through the night to Dublin. The flights were both pleasant, not crowded and pretty smooth. None of us were able to really sleep though so that was hard.

We got our car and began to learn to drive on the left. Dani drove first, then I did. It was scary and took two of us but we did pretty well and made it every where we wanted to go. 

Our first stop was an old castle that was just beautiful. The countryside is so pastoral and beautifully enchanting. Tons of cute little streets, sheep and cows, old churches and painted doors.

We stopped for lunch at a little shop in a little town and then headed to the hotel for a short rest.

So far it's been an awesome trip. Hopefully we won't screw up our sleep too much and we can be busy this evening and then get a good night before tomorrow.

So right away I've noticed some fun differences. The Irish are friendly. We've been getting lots of jaunty waves from cars as they drive by us.  Also we speak the same language...sort of. We've seen some lovely birds that I haven't seen before. One was a beautiful blue with black and white on it. Dani said it was a magpie but I'm going to look it up. Street signs are in Gaelic and English which is surprisingly confusing.

All the travelers have been cheerful and good adventurers! I didn't cry on the plane, Hannah didn't over pack, Sierra packed just right, and Dani's been snapping lots of good pictures!

Update: we took a two our nap, with an alarm set and then got up for the evening. 

Our first order of business was to find a grocery store to buy breakfast stuff and snacks. We enjoyed our shopping very much. While there we got a recommendation for a place to go to dinner. After consulting Siri we decided to  leave the car in the grocery store parking lot and walk to the restaurant. That ended up being an awesome choice!

We walked thru the town, looked at lots of wonderful churches and more cute doors. We stumbled onto a river and found the cutest shopping area. The street the restaurant was on has tons of shops and a theater, pubs and restaurants. We actually decided on a different place to eat than we originally picked. Hannah chose an Indian place called Royal Spice that was so yummy. We got two entrees and two starters and shared. We were all stuffed and the korma was the best Indian dish I've ever eaten. Two thumbs way up!!

Examples of our language difficulties.

Me to the waiter: is there a restroom?

Him: there is no parking on the street, there used to be but we moved. 

Me: huh??

Me: is there a bathroom?

Him: oh! Of course sorry. 

Example two: 

Nice lady at the grocery store: are you looking for a place to eat dinner? There's a great place that's not to expensive near here called lough viera.

Me: thanks!

Me to Siri: navigate to low viera.

Siri: nope try again

Me: searching the web

Oh la riviera!

Walking around the streets was a great experience we saw so many things.