Time to go 'home'

It would seem that one of our trips is never complete unless there's a long, slightly uncertain and often rainy search for a restaurant. So it was again in Dublin, this time searching for a converted warehouse/market yard that is now a tapas place. Matt had been there many years ago, but that wasn't quite enough local knowledge! The search was in the end, however worth it.

In another piece of genius non-planning, we knew only the bus number that would get us to the hotel near the airport. We didn't know where to get it, or where to get off. We also didn't know how to contact the hotel! Matt's mum found us the phone number, the lady at the hotel told us the street where we could pick up the bus, and tried to give us an idea of where to get off, but [to Matt at least] it didn't make much sense. We found the street, but not the bus, asked a few people as we walked vaguely in the direction of the airport. Eventually we ended up on the bus route, and a short while later (and thanks to a friendly bus driver) we were at the hotel. It just goes to show how inhospitable bus travel is to the unprepared. The free Dublin guidebook kindly said in regard to bus travel that one should look things up on the internet before your trip. Quite.

I'm [Matt] writing this from something like 36,000 feet, on the way to Frankfurt. I don't have Birgit's in-transit sleeping skills. Hopefully in around an hour we'll be meeting our good friend Prem in the Goethe Café in Frankfurt airport. Assuming we make it through what is going to be a very rainy landing (which caused us to wait for 45 minutes on the tarmac in Dublin). Astoundingly, security took about 10 minutes in Dublin instead of the normal 30+. That left time for porridge for me and a croissant for Birgit, so at least we're not hungry!