Adventures O' Dublin - Day Two

We got a late start today. Part of it was due to the fact that we are still not quite adjusted to the time difference and part of it was due to the fact that David had some business to attend to in the morning. We did, however, have a lot of the afternoon together to do some sightseeing.

We headed out for a bite to eat at a small café. Madeline, being over tired, was in major meltdown mode. We actually had to give her a time out in the restaurant. The server (who I think may have also been the owner) was kind enough to bring out a Barbie and, fittingly enough, a Bratz doll (what was I thinking to leave the hotel with out my bag of tricks?!?!) The Bratz doll was missing her feet so we decided to call her “Peg”. Madeline got much better after a bite to eat and was extremely excited to ride on a bus.

We had to make a stop for David to get an international cell phone for business purposes. In a one block area there were about 5 mobile phone stores. One of the store’s names was O2 and their advertisement had tons of yellow rubber duckies which Madeline thought was pretty cool. The mobile phone stuff took forever so Madeline and I strolled some neighboring stores while waiting for David. First souvenir….Madeline found a bright pink rubber duck with green shamrocks and a leprechaun hat. Okay…..whatever. I also bought a pen for my purse to have handy for the next restaurant.

We then got on a double-decker tour bus that stopped at all the major sites of the city. You can get off and on the bus at any of the stops. I highly recommend something like this if you plan to visit a city for only a short period of time. Like I side, it goes to all the highlights but also has a tour guide explaining what you are looking at as you drive around. As I previously mentioned, we had a late start to our day but then the tour busses only ran until 6:30pm. We really only had enough time to hop of the bus twice. So were did we go? St. Patrick’s Cathedral and the Guinness Brewery (not the tour, just the gift shop) When we got almost full circle on the bus tour, a few stops before our hotel, we decided to get off early at the Temple Bar. Although there is a bar called “Temple Bar”, it is also a district in Dublin.

Temple Bar district is like an entertainment district. We strolled through there, and passed by the actual “Temple Bar” where they were filming for a Guinness 250 year anniversary commercial. We took a photo of the outside because we figured that if the commercial got to the States we could say that we were there as it was being filmed. We also stopped to browse at a gift shop….tantrum #2 of the day. All I have to say about her tantrums lately is Holy Crap!

We hit a restaurant for dinner. Thank God Madeline was well behaved, although the pen I bought was very much put to use during our wait. I do have to say that everyone we have encountered here in Dublin has been very friendly, although the restaurant service is a bit slow…..but, you roll with the flow. After diner we stopped for some European-style ice cream followed by a leisurely stroll back to the hotel. Either Madeline’s sleep schedule is *way* off (but I can’t see how she is not tired after all this activity today and no nap) or the sugar from the ice cream has kicked in. It as I type this, it is 7:30 EST or 11:30pm Dublin time and she is STILL awake. Don’t get me wrong, she is in bed, but she is just singing away…..sigh!

Tomorrow we are back to the airport on a plane to London. We will be there for four nights. We are actually staying in a flat, rather than a hotel. If we are not mistaken, the flat will have high speed Internet so, hopefully I will have better luck posting pictures from London.