When traveling to Dublin....
When traveling to Dublin, it is a good idea to reserve a hostel. It is a doubly good idea to reserve a room in a hostel that actually exists. Yes, you read that right. The full dramatics is behind the cut; Abby and I are physically safe (though emotionally exhausted), as is my bank account. We met quite a few Irish angels this weekend.
The trip to Bristol, and the flight from Bristol-Dublin on Thursday night was incredibly easy. So easy, in fact, that we should have been prepared for something to go wrong. The flight landed about 10 minutes early in Dublin. We were way excited, expecting to get to the hostel earlier than we expected, get a good nights sleep and take Dublin by storm on Friday.
What actually ended up happening is not nearly as nice as all that. We got off of the bus that brought us downtown from the airport (there was a very nice old Irish man who gave us an informal 'tour' of the city as we passed through)right around midnight. We made it to the address of the hostel without a problem. Knocked on the door, no answer. Rang the bell, no answer. Took out our cellphones and discovered that UK SIM cards don't work in the Republic of Ireland (emergency only). The place we were at looked fairly residential, so we decided to go into the pub up the street and ask for directions. The directions that the guy gave us were horrible - I think he had no idea where we were trying to get to and just told us something to get us out, as the place was closing. We wandered around for about 20 minutes before deciding to get a cab. We figured a cabbie would know where the place was.
Well, he did. He brought us back to the place we were at originally. Abby got out and knocked again; the cabbie got out and tried. He also tried calling the number we had for the place, and was unable to get through. Eventually, he said that he would take us to a Travelodge so we could have a place for the night and we could come back and try to sort things out in the morning.
The Travelodge was full. The Polish man behind the desk was very rude and told us that there was nothing that we could do, and he had no idea where to send us. We left, and saw that there was a Days Inn about 100 yards up the road. We walked in and got the same answer - absolutely no rooms left available for the night (it was also well after midnight by this point). Cliff, who turned out to be an American from Kentucky, was the dude behind the desk. He was very kind to us. He tried to contact the Donnybrook hostel for us, and even let me use the computer to try and figure something out. By this time, we didn't have any options. All of the places that he usually sends customers were booked full. By this point, I was starting to panic. Luckily, he took pity on us and let us stay in the lounge of the lobby. We ended up staying up pretty much all night, talking to him and such. We laughed at the drunk guests coming in, had deep philosophical conversation about God and he answered all of our questions about Dublin, and Ireland in general. He's a very interesting character. An angel in disguise (if a bit old - 40ish).
At 7am we decided that it was time to make our way back to Donnybrook. The whole walk back over there, I was doing a very good job of channeling my father, preparing what I was going to say to the manager, how I was going to get us our money back, etc etc. Nothing had changed when we got back to the place. Looking through the mail slot I could see what looked like a reception area, with a desk and a carpet and a laptop (which was on), but no person. I banged on the door, and we sat out there for about an hour, until a woman came out of the neighboring house at about 8 am. I asked her if the place was a youth hostel, and she looked at me funny and told us that the place had been under construction for quite a while and was certainly not a youth hostel.
This was a major "oh shit" moment. It was not the last one. I still didn't want to think through to all of the possible implications of this, so we hailed a cab to the tourist information center in the center of the city. We had to wait until 9 am for the place to open. We wasted our time, because as soon as we started to explain the situation to the woman, she told us to go to the police. "Oh shit" moment #2. She gave us bad directions to the police station, and a passing woman took pity on us after we had been walking for a while and pointed us in the right direction.
The police station that we went to was not able to help us because the address of the hostel was not within it's jurisdiction. What the officer was able to tell me was that the contact number on the information I had on the place was a cell phone number, not a land line. "OH SHIT" moment. I started crying, and having visions of my bank account having a zero balance when I managed to find a computer and check. The homeless Irish man who was in the station patted my hand and tried to be nice and say "It's OK lassie, at least you've got a friend", referring to Abby.
We walked around for a half an hour or so trying to find an internet cafe, but were unsuccessful. Eventually we hailed another cab to bring us to the right police station. Turns out that this cabbie is a retired cop who does this on the side to make some money; when we told him the story he turned off the meter and only charged us 4 euros for what should have been a 10 euro trip.
Sgt. John Scully at this police station (he's got the same birthday as me, but is a year older), continued the trend of nice sympathetic Irish people listening to our tale. He took down all of my information and advised me to get to a computer and check my account, and then we'd proceed from there depending on what we found. During the hike to find a place was the only time that Abby showed even a bit of annoyance with the situation - she was hungry and had to go to the bathroom and had been up for over 24 hours and she was still holding up a hell of a lot better than I was.
There are no unexpected charges on my account at this point (thank the lord).
After getting that welcome relief, we hailed (another) cab to take us to the part of Dublin where all the youth hostels are. Finding a room was a nightmare. By the grace of God (or whatever), we were able to get 2 beds in a six person dorm for Friday night. It was a nice place, and we shared the room with two Italians and a French couple. By this point, it was (only!) 11:30 am ish, and the room wasn't going to be ready for us to check into until 2pm.
Since we had a place to stay, we went out and actually did what we had come to Dublin to do - be tourists. We got on a hop-on, hop-off tour of the city and saw a lot of stuff. I don't remember a lot of it, honestly, because I was too tired to keep my eyes open. Being that tired is worse than being drunk.
We crashed for two hours at the hostel before dinner. Went out to Temple Bar (the bar district of the city), had dinner, had a pint, did some retail therapy. By 10 pm, we were finished. Completely done. Went back to the hostel, to our room with the Italians and the French couple.
Unfortunately, the hostel didn't have any available beds for last night (Saturday). Since it was so early - we got up and out by 8:30 - there was no point in going in search of a different place to stay yet, so we went and finished being tourists. We saw Trinity College (The Book of Kells), the Guinness Factory (free pint, I barely finished half of it), Kilmainheim Jail (where they executed the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising, among other things), the General Post Office (site of the Easter Rising), etc etc etc. Basically, we were able to get to see everything that we had wanted to.
By 3pm, it was too late for us and our quest for a bed. There was a really big soccer match between Germany and Ireland last night, and I swear that there were more Germans out than Irish. We went everywhere, and there was absolutely no place to stay. One place had one bed, but the wouldn't let us share it. Another place only accepted cash, and was sketchy enough that I didn't feel safe in the lobby, nevermind in a dorm room in the place. We ended up paying 4 euros to store our backpacks at an internet cafe, and walked around the center of Dublin, did shopping, etc. I got a new clattaugh ring, a nice necklace, and a few Christmas gifts for the family. We found an out of the way pub that wasn't too crowded and ordered dinner. We nursed our pints for a long long time; we stayed there for probably three hours. We did get refills, we weren't that bad. Watched the game. By 9pm we decided to just make our way to the airport; we figured there might be chance of finding a room somewhere outside the city center. Well, there wasn't, so we slept at the airport last night. By 'slept' I actually mean 'dozed off for a couple of hours'.
So basically, it was the weekend from Hell. It wasn't 100% bad though, if you can believe it. For one thing, Abby and I bonded like nothing else. We had to be adults and figure this shit out ourselves, because as much as I wanted to call my father at some points, there was nothing he would be able to do that I wasn't already doing on my own. We still managed to see Dublin.
So that is my weekend. The neighbor is finally done with his hammering or whatever he was doing outside, so I am going to try and catch up on some sleep before dinner. I'm insisting that we triple check the hostels we're staying at next week in Poland and Prague, because the very last thing that needs to happen if for a repeat of this situation. That is happening tonight after dinner.
If you made it all the way through, congratulations. I guess this was one of those Learning Experiences that I came over to Europe to have. It blew. But I got through it.
The trip to Bristol, and the flight from Bristol-Dublin on Thursday night was incredibly easy. So easy, in fact, that we should have been prepared for something to go wrong. The flight landed about 10 minutes early in Dublin. We were way excited, expecting to get to the hostel earlier than we expected, get a good nights sleep and take Dublin by storm on Friday.
What actually ended up happening is not nearly as nice as all that. We got off of the bus that brought us downtown from the airport (there was a very nice old Irish man who gave us an informal 'tour' of the city as we passed through)right around midnight. We made it to the address of the hostel without a problem. Knocked on the door, no answer. Rang the bell, no answer. Took out our cellphones and discovered that UK SIM cards don't work in the Republic of Ireland (emergency only). The place we were at looked fairly residential, so we decided to go into the pub up the street and ask for directions. The directions that the guy gave us were horrible - I think he had no idea where we were trying to get to and just told us something to get us out, as the place was closing. We wandered around for about 20 minutes before deciding to get a cab. We figured a cabbie would know where the place was.
Well, he did. He brought us back to the place we were at originally. Abby got out and knocked again; the cabbie got out and tried. He also tried calling the number we had for the place, and was unable to get through. Eventually, he said that he would take us to a Travelodge so we could have a place for the night and we could come back and try to sort things out in the morning.
The Travelodge was full. The Polish man behind the desk was very rude and told us that there was nothing that we could do, and he had no idea where to send us. We left, and saw that there was a Days Inn about 100 yards up the road. We walked in and got the same answer - absolutely no rooms left available for the night (it was also well after midnight by this point). Cliff, who turned out to be an American from Kentucky, was the dude behind the desk. He was very kind to us. He tried to contact the Donnybrook hostel for us, and even let me use the computer to try and figure something out. By this time, we didn't have any options. All of the places that he usually sends customers were booked full. By this point, I was starting to panic. Luckily, he took pity on us and let us stay in the lounge of the lobby. We ended up staying up pretty much all night, talking to him and such. We laughed at the drunk guests coming in, had deep philosophical conversation about God and he answered all of our questions about Dublin, and Ireland in general. He's a very interesting character. An angel in disguise (if a bit old - 40ish).
At 7am we decided that it was time to make our way back to Donnybrook. The whole walk back over there, I was doing a very good job of channeling my father, preparing what I was going to say to the manager, how I was going to get us our money back, etc etc. Nothing had changed when we got back to the place. Looking through the mail slot I could see what looked like a reception area, with a desk and a carpet and a laptop (which was on), but no person. I banged on the door, and we sat out there for about an hour, until a woman came out of the neighboring house at about 8 am. I asked her if the place was a youth hostel, and she looked at me funny and told us that the place had been under construction for quite a while and was certainly not a youth hostel.
This was a major "oh shit" moment. It was not the last one. I still didn't want to think through to all of the possible implications of this, so we hailed a cab to the tourist information center in the center of the city. We had to wait until 9 am for the place to open. We wasted our time, because as soon as we started to explain the situation to the woman, she told us to go to the police. "Oh shit" moment #2. She gave us bad directions to the police station, and a passing woman took pity on us after we had been walking for a while and pointed us in the right direction.
The police station that we went to was not able to help us because the address of the hostel was not within it's jurisdiction. What the officer was able to tell me was that the contact number on the information I had on the place was a cell phone number, not a land line. "OH SHIT" moment. I started crying, and having visions of my bank account having a zero balance when I managed to find a computer and check. The homeless Irish man who was in the station patted my hand and tried to be nice and say "It's OK lassie, at least you've got a friend", referring to Abby.
We walked around for a half an hour or so trying to find an internet cafe, but were unsuccessful. Eventually we hailed another cab to bring us to the right police station. Turns out that this cabbie is a retired cop who does this on the side to make some money; when we told him the story he turned off the meter and only charged us 4 euros for what should have been a 10 euro trip.
Sgt. John Scully at this police station (he's got the same birthday as me, but is a year older), continued the trend of nice sympathetic Irish people listening to our tale. He took down all of my information and advised me to get to a computer and check my account, and then we'd proceed from there depending on what we found. During the hike to find a place was the only time that Abby showed even a bit of annoyance with the situation - she was hungry and had to go to the bathroom and had been up for over 24 hours and she was still holding up a hell of a lot better than I was.
There are no unexpected charges on my account at this point (thank the lord).
After getting that welcome relief, we hailed (another) cab to take us to the part of Dublin where all the youth hostels are. Finding a room was a nightmare. By the grace of God (or whatever), we were able to get 2 beds in a six person dorm for Friday night. It was a nice place, and we shared the room with two Italians and a French couple. By this point, it was (only!) 11:30 am ish, and the room wasn't going to be ready for us to check into until 2pm.
Since we had a place to stay, we went out and actually did what we had come to Dublin to do - be tourists. We got on a hop-on, hop-off tour of the city and saw a lot of stuff. I don't remember a lot of it, honestly, because I was too tired to keep my eyes open. Being that tired is worse than being drunk.
We crashed for two hours at the hostel before dinner. Went out to Temple Bar (the bar district of the city), had dinner, had a pint, did some retail therapy. By 10 pm, we were finished. Completely done. Went back to the hostel, to our room with the Italians and the French couple.
Unfortunately, the hostel didn't have any available beds for last night (Saturday). Since it was so early - we got up and out by 8:30 - there was no point in going in search of a different place to stay yet, so we went and finished being tourists. We saw Trinity College (The Book of Kells), the Guinness Factory (free pint, I barely finished half of it), Kilmainheim Jail (where they executed the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising, among other things), the General Post Office (site of the Easter Rising), etc etc etc. Basically, we were able to get to see everything that we had wanted to.
By 3pm, it was too late for us and our quest for a bed. There was a really big soccer match between Germany and Ireland last night, and I swear that there were more Germans out than Irish. We went everywhere, and there was absolutely no place to stay. One place had one bed, but the wouldn't let us share it. Another place only accepted cash, and was sketchy enough that I didn't feel safe in the lobby, nevermind in a dorm room in the place. We ended up paying 4 euros to store our backpacks at an internet cafe, and walked around the center of Dublin, did shopping, etc. I got a new clattaugh ring, a nice necklace, and a few Christmas gifts for the family. We found an out of the way pub that wasn't too crowded and ordered dinner. We nursed our pints for a long long time; we stayed there for probably three hours. We did get refills, we weren't that bad. Watched the game. By 9pm we decided to just make our way to the airport; we figured there might be chance of finding a room somewhere outside the city center. Well, there wasn't, so we slept at the airport last night. By 'slept' I actually mean 'dozed off for a couple of hours'.
So basically, it was the weekend from Hell. It wasn't 100% bad though, if you can believe it. For one thing, Abby and I bonded like nothing else. We had to be adults and figure this shit out ourselves, because as much as I wanted to call my father at some points, there was nothing he would be able to do that I wasn't already doing on my own. We still managed to see Dublin.
So that is my weekend. The neighbor is finally done with his hammering or whatever he was doing outside, so I am going to try and catch up on some sleep before dinner. I'm insisting that we triple check the hostels we're staying at next week in Poland and Prague, because the very last thing that needs to happen if for a repeat of this situation. That is happening tonight after dinner.
If you made it all the way through, congratulations. I guess this was one of those Learning Experiences that I came over to Europe to have. It blew. But I got through it.