Dublin story...finally
Ok, so I’m finally getting around to writing about my trip to Dublin – it’s been a busy at work…ok not really, but I have had to write up a report and send into my manager back there in Chicago and people keep moving us from office space to office space, anyways, here’s my story about Ireland.
First off, this only works if you pretend to hear me talking with a fake Irish accent. So, I booked my ticket with this website lastminute.com. At fist glance the website looked nice enough and so I booked a trip on a local airline and a stay in a decent hotel (like a 3 star)…then the fun started. I got an email a few days later telling me that they had to drop my hotel reservation and rebook me into a 2 star hotel…needless to say, I was pretty ticked off. More than anything, it was the fact that they booked me in a lower hotel class and didn’t even offer any sort of compensation – so I wrote them a nasty email telling them that “in my experience, the customer is number one” (you know, all that crap)…they replied that they were sorry for the inconvenience and were going to refund some of my money. *note to self, write more nasty emails*. The next day I then headed off to the airport at about 4 in the morning…you see, the town I’m in is so out in the Welsh countryside that the closest airport of any size was like 2 ½ hrs away. So I get on my flight and land safely…ok, I’m using the term “safely” here pretty liberally – by “safe” I mean that we landed…it was the roughest landing I’ve ever experienced and let’s all be happy that nothing fell of the plane (is there a community college for pilots…perhaps online courses??).
After I landed, I got to ride on one of those double-decker busses, which was pretty awesome. Once I got to the center of town (which has this really huge spike in the middle…not sure of the purpose, other than to help drunk people, and lost tourists, find their way) I went searching for my hotel. I started off down the river, walking away from the town center…and kept walking….still walking…hmm, this looks kinda like a ghetto…yeah, definitely a ghetto…if I have to take off running, can I run faster if I jack my backpack up higher??....ah, finally, my hotel. It looks ok from the outside – nice little pub at the bottom and all, so I went into the bar (yes, I had to check in at the bar…this should have been my first clue)…but the room wasn’t ready yet. Back to town.
My fist stop was Trinity College, which is pretty impressive, and a little weird b/c I kept wondering if there was any relation to the one in Deerfield. Then I set off toward the Guinness brewery, but got hungry on the way and ate at a traditional Irish restaurant…Quiznos...dunno if you’ve heard of it. Anyway, on to the brewery…needless to say, it was awesome!!!!! I even learned to pour the “perfect pint” (and I have a certificate to prove it), got some free beer (well, free with price of admission), and got to learn about my favorite beer. It was glorious. Fun fact…Arthur Guinness (the guy who invented it) was brilliant – he secured the lease for the St. James Gate Brewery (i.e. Guinness brewery) back in the late 1700’s for a 9000 yr lease at like 45 pounds a month…”ultimate rent control…brilliant!!” There is also this cool bar at the top/end of the tour where you have a great view of Dublin.
After the brewery I decided to go back to my hotel and check in (and drop off the load of souvenirs I had procured so far. Stopped at Christ Church on the way…lovely. Speaking of lovely…as I said on facebook, I think I’m in love with the women of Ireland…well, ok, their accents anyway….brilliant!!. Yeah, so I checked into my hostel…hotel…nope, definitely a glorified hostel. I at least had my own bed and toilet, but that’s about it, it was basically a closet with a bathroom. Not cool, especially when I’m paying like 60 pounds for the room (this is like 100-120 bucks) – yeah, I know!! Needless, to say ,I wasn’t too happy…my trip to Dublin (Guinness mission accomplished) had now become a quest for a better hotel! The search began…I quickly discovered that every hotel in Dublin was booked for the night…got a nice walking tour of Dublin though, cool city…saw lots of cool stuff, and met a bunch of hotel desk people.. My search finally brought me to the end of the tourist part of Dublin (at the end of this pedestrian walking shopping area – very nice)…so a few blocks past this shopping area, I see a small sign for a hotel (as a side note, the street I’m on looks like nothing but condos) called Copper Jack’s or something. This being my last resort, I go in and ask for a room and the attendant says that the only thing they have is next door; I’m so happy that I found something that I don’t care if it’s back across town. So we go and see the room and (please see pics – this is my 2nd hotel room) and it’s amazing, esp for only like 40 euros more than my original room. I took the room! Then I went back to my original hotel (yeah, by this point, I’m pretty experienced at getting around Dublin, lol) and come back. Oh, as a side story, on my way back to my 1st hotel (which as I mentioned, is kinda in the ghetto) this van slows as it approaches me and then pulls over really fast – now I’m ready to fight at this point, but it turns out he was some lost tourist and needed directions…not as exciting is it…so let’s pretend that it was kidnappers/muggers/terrorists and I fought them off – yeah, I know, some people would call me a hero…some call me a space cowboy, some call me a gangster of love…some call me Morice ‘casue I speak on the pompatous of love…so yeah, I'm walking back to my (new) hotel and I see this line of people out the door for, what looks like a regular apartment. Only, not many apartments I know have huge bouncers outside (unless it's to keep out Jehovah's witnesses and sales people). So, it turns out there is some really popular underground night club under my hotel...pretty cool. And no, unfortunately, I didn't go in (left my "clubbin" apparel in Tenby, of all places, haha). Fortunately, I couldn't hear it from my room...
So…anyway, a very long story short – I found a great hotel room, got a great tour of Dublin, found a secret night club, and spent as much as if I’d just booked the trip myself instead of using one of those travel websites...but had fun! :-)
First off, this only works if you pretend to hear me talking with a fake Irish accent. So, I booked my ticket with this website lastminute.com. At fist glance the website looked nice enough and so I booked a trip on a local airline and a stay in a decent hotel (like a 3 star)…then the fun started. I got an email a few days later telling me that they had to drop my hotel reservation and rebook me into a 2 star hotel…needless to say, I was pretty ticked off. More than anything, it was the fact that they booked me in a lower hotel class and didn’t even offer any sort of compensation – so I wrote them a nasty email telling them that “in my experience, the customer is number one” (you know, all that crap)…they replied that they were sorry for the inconvenience and were going to refund some of my money. *note to self, write more nasty emails*. The next day I then headed off to the airport at about 4 in the morning…you see, the town I’m in is so out in the Welsh countryside that the closest airport of any size was like 2 ½ hrs away. So I get on my flight and land safely…ok, I’m using the term “safely” here pretty liberally – by “safe” I mean that we landed…it was the roughest landing I’ve ever experienced and let’s all be happy that nothing fell of the plane (is there a community college for pilots…perhaps online courses??).
After I landed, I got to ride on one of those double-decker busses, which was pretty awesome. Once I got to the center of town (which has this really huge spike in the middle…not sure of the purpose, other than to help drunk people, and lost tourists, find their way) I went searching for my hotel. I started off down the river, walking away from the town center…and kept walking….still walking…hmm, this looks kinda like a ghetto…yeah, definitely a ghetto…if I have to take off running, can I run faster if I jack my backpack up higher??....ah, finally, my hotel. It looks ok from the outside – nice little pub at the bottom and all, so I went into the bar (yes, I had to check in at the bar…this should have been my first clue)…but the room wasn’t ready yet. Back to town.
My fist stop was Trinity College, which is pretty impressive, and a little weird b/c I kept wondering if there was any relation to the one in Deerfield. Then I set off toward the Guinness brewery, but got hungry on the way and ate at a traditional Irish restaurant…Quiznos...dunno if you’ve heard of it. Anyway, on to the brewery…needless to say, it was awesome!!!!! I even learned to pour the “perfect pint” (and I have a certificate to prove it), got some free beer (well, free with price of admission), and got to learn about my favorite beer. It was glorious. Fun fact…Arthur Guinness (the guy who invented it) was brilliant – he secured the lease for the St. James Gate Brewery (i.e. Guinness brewery) back in the late 1700’s for a 9000 yr lease at like 45 pounds a month…”ultimate rent control…brilliant!!” There is also this cool bar at the top/end of the tour where you have a great view of Dublin.
After the brewery I decided to go back to my hotel and check in (and drop off the load of souvenirs I had procured so far. Stopped at Christ Church on the way…lovely. Speaking of lovely…as I said on facebook, I think I’m in love with the women of Ireland…well, ok, their accents anyway….brilliant!!. Yeah, so I checked into my hostel…hotel…nope, definitely a glorified hostel. I at least had my own bed and toilet, but that’s about it, it was basically a closet with a bathroom. Not cool, especially when I’m paying like 60 pounds for the room (this is like 100-120 bucks) – yeah, I know!! Needless, to say ,I wasn’t too happy…my trip to Dublin (Guinness mission accomplished) had now become a quest for a better hotel! The search began…I quickly discovered that every hotel in Dublin was booked for the night…got a nice walking tour of Dublin though, cool city…saw lots of cool stuff, and met a bunch of hotel desk people.. My search finally brought me to the end of the tourist part of Dublin (at the end of this pedestrian walking shopping area – very nice)…so a few blocks past this shopping area, I see a small sign for a hotel (as a side note, the street I’m on looks like nothing but condos) called Copper Jack’s or something. This being my last resort, I go in and ask for a room and the attendant says that the only thing they have is next door; I’m so happy that I found something that I don’t care if it’s back across town. So we go and see the room and (please see pics – this is my 2nd hotel room) and it’s amazing, esp for only like 40 euros more than my original room. I took the room! Then I went back to my original hotel (yeah, by this point, I’m pretty experienced at getting around Dublin, lol) and come back. Oh, as a side story, on my way back to my 1st hotel (which as I mentioned, is kinda in the ghetto) this van slows as it approaches me and then pulls over really fast – now I’m ready to fight at this point, but it turns out he was some lost tourist and needed directions…not as exciting is it…so let’s pretend that it was kidnappers/muggers/terrorists and I fought them off – yeah, I know, some people would call me a hero…some call me a space cowboy, some call me a gangster of love…some call me Morice ‘casue I speak on the pompatous of love…so yeah, I'm walking back to my (new) hotel and I see this line of people out the door for, what looks like a regular apartment. Only, not many apartments I know have huge bouncers outside (unless it's to keep out Jehovah's witnesses and sales people). So, it turns out there is some really popular underground night club under my hotel...pretty cool. And no, unfortunately, I didn't go in (left my "clubbin" apparel in Tenby, of all places, haha). Fortunately, I couldn't hear it from my room...
So…anyway, a very long story short – I found a great hotel room, got a great tour of Dublin, found a secret night club, and spent as much as if I’d just booked the trip myself instead of using one of those travel websites...but had fun! :-)
posted by ramblinwreck at 11:28 AM
1 Comments:
haha remind me to tell you about the time I booked a hotel in peru online and ended up sitting on my backpack on a streetcorner for over an hour...miss you!!!!
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