Dublin - vikings

Yesterday in Dublin was a rest day. Shane went to Trinity College for work so the girls and I hung out at our 'house'....we did some school-work, walked to the village and went and fed the swans...quite peaceful really.

Our 'house'...not quite as beautiful as many others in the village - but its fine for us!

In the evening after Shane came back - we walked up to the village and went to the local pub for a drink (or two)...

One of the things I love about Dublin (and this may be the case across all of Ireland) - are the flowers. They are in full bloom and they are EVERYWHERE! Most of the lamp-posts in the villages are covered in them and even some buildings....it is just a beautiful to see the colours...

It is nice to see a splash of brightness on an otherwise grey day.....

























Today - marks 3 weeks since we left for this adventure. In many ways it has gone so quickly but when I look back at all the things we have seen and done it does feel much longer....

This morning dawned bright and clear (we are now up 'early' at around 8am!). By 9am a fog had rolled in but it didn't seem like rain so we headed into the city to do some more exploring.

First stop was (of course) the playground at St Stephens Green. Since discovering it (and the baskety-swings/spinners) the girls have been desperate to go back. This time, on a Wednesday morning, the playground was almost deserted so the girls could go crazy on all the equipment.

Once that was out of their system we headed for the National Museum of Ireland (History and Archaeology). We chose this because the kids were keen to learn a bit about Vikings because about every 2 minutes in Dublin it seems we see a "Viking Splash" tour bus drive past. The Viking Splash bus is this monstrous yellow thing that drives around town (and eventually drives into the river Liffey that runs through Dublin) and everyone who goes on the bus has to wear viking helmets and yell loudly at people as they drive past. Must get a photo which might help explain it!

Anyway - the girls have been asking about Vikings (or "MyKings" as Eloise calls them) so we thought the museum was a good place to learn. It was a nice little museum that has a good display of viking stuff (although no helmets which left Neve slightly disappointed). Neve liked the viking model house and the dressed up figures. Eloise liked drawing on the children's activity sheets.

Neve practising to be a 'lady'

Viking model house with Neve pulling a 'viking face'



















After the museum we walked through town, to see Dublin Castle.

We walked past the Cathedral and then into 'Temple Bar' - an older area of Dublin that is famous for all of its pubs and nightlife. Not sure we will make it here in the evenings, however it is still a great place to go during the day and we grabbed some chips for lunch and sat down on some steps and listened to some buskers playing.

A stroll along the river-front and we were back at the dart station ready to come home. Neve is getting good at using the Dart and feels very grown up with her own ticket to insert into the machine.

Tomorrow we are hiring a car to venture further into Ireland....still not sure of the itinerary yet but will see where the road takes us.

3 weeks down - 10 weeks to go!!!!!

Dublin - Olympic fever

Another late start this morning…sleeping in until 9am.

The day was brighter than yesterday so we took an ‘early’ morning stroll to the beach which is down the road from where we are staying. It is one of those beaches where, when the tide goes out, it goes out so far you can’t even see the water! Eloise was desperate for a ‘swim’ so was a bit disappointed – although I think she would have been more disappointed had she actually been able to feel how cold the water is!

Later that morning (or it might have been early afternoon) we took the dart into the city again to explore St Stephens Green. It’s a really pretty park – like Central Park on a MUCH smaller scale…it even has the horse drawn carriages outside waiting to take tourists for a ride (in more ways than one!).

There was a nice playground in the park, with a very cool baskety-swing type thing that the girls loved, and another baskety-turny type thing that they also had fun with….

We found a nice little pub just down the street and went inside for lunch.

There was a big screen inside with the Olympics on and it was all pretty peaceful for a while until suddenly the sound was turned up on the big screen and I turned around to discover the pub was now absolutely packed….it was time to make an exit with the kids. We walked out of the pub and straight into about 6 policemen standing at the door – I thought it was the beginnings of a riot until I realised they were there to watch the television that was setup just outside the pub. Apparently Ireland’s great Olympic medal hopeful (a female boxer called Katie Taylor) was fighting for a medal position against a British boxer. Luckily for us, and most of Ireland I suspect, Katie won her fight.

Speaking of Olympics – it is extrodinary to see the different coverages from the different countries compared to our own. In America it was only about the American athletes – I am not sure they even knew the names of any other competitors. Granted America has won the most medals and so almost all events that are covered in America were won by Americans.

In Ireland, we are seeing the UK coverage mostly – which of course is aimed at British athletes. And they are doing extraordinarily well too. But the coverage is far less biased.

I must admit we have heard little about Australia and how they are doing – which by all effects is probably a good thing because I don’t think we are doing great….Australia isn’t even on the medal tally when they show it on TV.

And speaking of TV – is it just my children all do all kids watch any cartoon on TV? Yesterday they were fixated by an episode of Spongebob Squarepants on TV that was dubbed in Gaelic! They couldn’t understand a word but wouldn’t let me turn it off!

Anyway – I digress.  After lunch we wandered down and around the city, stopping at Trinity College who Shane will be working with for the next few weeks.  Dublin really is a lovely city and quite compact to walk around – but then anything would seem small after New York!

Later today we went down the to stream near our place and fed some of the ducks. There was also a ‘school’ of seagull-type birds who were led by a larger bird, who were renamed all of 1T and Mrs Thornton!

1T and Mrs Thornton the birds, as named by Neve.

Eloise testing her photography skills at Trinity College - not bad!

Dublin - the tooth leprechaun

Top ‘o the mornin’ to you…

Now I know why the Irish say this. The sun doesn’t set until a ridiculously late time (around 9pm) and so the kids are awake until then…so nobody gets out of bed in the morning before 9am – so they are not even out of the house until the top (or late) part of the morning…

That’s my theory and I am sticking to it. The shops don’t even open until midday.

Yesterday afternoon we walked in the sunshine into the village and went to the pub for a drink…Shane had already been for a beer the day before (“Just to meet the locals” he insists) but it was the first Irish pub experience for the girls who were delighted with their pink lemonades…and my gin and tonic hit the spot nicely.

After dinner yesterday – at almost 8pm but in bright daylight, we took a walk along the river path that runs near our place and found a family of white swans (who were all named after Neve’s classmates) and a mother duck with 3 ducklings (of course called Eloise, Jessica and Naomi). Must remember to take pictures of them.

Today, however, was a very slow day - apart from Neve losing her 2nd ever tooth!! We are interested to see what the conversion rate from $AUD to Euro is for the tooth fairy (or will it be a tooth leprechaun)!! It was past 1pm before we were even organised enough to get out of the house. But having said that it was raining all morning so motivation to go out wasn’t high.

But we rallied and took the ‘dart’ into the city centre. We found a lovely pub/wine bar/café for lunch where I had a beautiful minestrone soup (probably more vegetables than I have had since leaving Australia!) and the kids demolished spaghetti bolognaise.

We then wandered to the edge of St Stephens Green (a big park that was too wet to explore) and around Grafton St - one of the main pedestrian streets (closed to traffic) in Dublin.

We found some new shoes for Eloise so she was very excited and is now determined to keep them clean – no more jumping in puddles for her (for now).

Eloise and her new shoes

Neve and her not-new shoes, perhaps the tooth fairy might leave enough money for her to get a new pair!!

New York to Dublin

What a hectic 48 hours – another day another 7,500km travelled!

We had a final half a day in New York – a last goodbye to Central Park and the playground with the swinging tyre.

America was a fabulous experience! It was HOT (my goodness it was hot)…and it was crowded...but no one can say that America and Americans are not full of life and living it to the fullest! They are polite, helpful and friendly bunch and America, whilst not ‘beautiful’ in a sense like Europe, it has a uniqueness and energy that makes it special in its own way. We will be back!

Now – the flight to Dublin was, in a word – tough. Not tough in the sense that the kids were terrible or the food, service, etc was bad – because none of these were true. Again the girls were as close to perfect as you can expect and we flew Swiss air and those Swiss people are a polite and efficient bunch.

But it was tough in terms of jetlag and time differences. I always thought the Sydney-Europe flight was pretty horrendous – leaving in the afternoon and landing the following morning bleary-eyed and exhausted….but at least in that journey you have 24 hours to try and get at least ‘some’ sleep.

This flight (or flights) were strange in that we left New York at 6:30pm…they served us dinner at about 8:00pm and then turned down the lights at around 9:30pm. No problem. But a mere 2.5 hours later the lights were back on and we were served breakfast…landing at the equivalent of 1:30am (New York time) which was 8am (Swiss time, or 7am Ireland time). So we had to fit in a night of sleep in a 2.5 hour time frame…impossible!!!

We had to fly from New York to Zurich, Switzerland first (part of our around the world ticket conditions) and then back-track to Dublin, Ireland.

 

With the last name “Dempsey” we are in our element in Ireland…there are thousands of us here! Neve happens to be one of the most popular girls names in Ireland so she should be right at home.

Landing at Dublin airport we were one of the last through the immigration check. The man at the passport control looked Neve up and down and agreed that she looked every inch the Irish girl...although he admitted that he had never, ever seen Neve spelt the way we do. We have an “Australian-ised” version of Neve’s name – which in Ireland is spelt Niamh (but we figured not many people in Australia would know how to pronounce it correctly).

Dublin was about 15 degrees cooler than New York –about 17 degrees (which is much the same as we are having mid-winter at home). It didn’t ‘feel’ as cold as Sydney but the temperature drop was a welcome relief I must admit.

We were all exhausted so it was blissful but slightly surreal to arrive in our accommodation for the next 3 weeks, which is in a quiet residential area just 2 stops on the “dart” (the Dublin light rail system) from the centre of Dublin. A short stroll to the centre of the village, past gorgeous little terraces and cottages…it seemed so incredibly different from the noise, pace, crowds and heat of New York!

We barely managed to eat dinner before going to bed. Nearly 14 hours later we emerged feeling far more human and ready to explore.

We caught the dart into the city and wandered along O’Connell and Henry streets which are two of the main shopping streets in Dublin. The crowds here gave us a sense of familiarity with the last 2 weeks.

 Dublin is a beautiful city and Shane has decided the Irish accent is one of the best in the world – it is very melodic. We are looking forward to the next 3 weeks exploring this city and the rest of Ireland as well.

New York - Sein-tastic

Today was a busy day.

We walked a LOT. Firstly we walked all over Greenwich Village (the west village) - pretty place. Shane loved it because it has many grungy looking cafes that look like they serve REAL coffee...something he hasn't found in the US so far - he is actually not drinking coffee since we have been here, maybe one every 3 or 4 days.

We found a fabulous bakery that sold amazing cookies - the girls struggled to choose but rainbow sprinkles won out in the end (as it always does).

And I found a place that I am sure a few of my colleagues would enjoy going to....

After exploring the village, we caught the subway to Brooklyn and walked back into Manhattan (in the rain) over the bridge. Actually - we RAN over the Brooklyn bridge because Eloise decided she needed to go to the toilet halfway across!!!
Still managed to get a few photos of uptown, downtown and the statue of liberty on the way over...

The Brooklyn Bridge




















































 





 The Statue of Liberty

 Downtown Manhattan - the central business district
















 Uptown Manhattan - the shopping and theatre district

















For dinner tonight - we went down Broadway to a little Diner that may look familiar to many Seinfeld fans....

The inside isn't exactly like the TV show - but there is a lot of Seinfeld memorabilia....and I swear friends of Mr and Mrs Costanza were at the table beside us!

Tomorrow afternoon we fly out to Dublin, Ireland (via Zurich, Switzerland - go figure) so I suspect we will spend most of our final hours in New York at Central Park.

New York has been fabulous. It's a busy, busy, busy city that holds more people than I thought could exist in one place together - it certainly is the city that never sleeps and I will leave knowing that we have taken quite a big bite out of the Big Apple!!!

New York - new shoes

My shoes are broken. My brand new shoes that I bought before I left have literally worn out on the bottom....is this a sign that I need to go shopping?

This morning I walked along Broadway...just window shopping until I realised that one shoe was making a clunking sound as I walked. So window shopping became a mission to find some new shoes.

Mission accomplished. Nothing fancy, although I 'could' have gone silly - but I got some shoes that will hopefully last me more than 2 weeks...

So to test out the new shoes we had a picnic lunch in Central Park. I say 'we' but it was really only Shane and I who had a picnic - Neve and Eloise were too busy trying to catch a squirrel (unsuccesfully I might add). Although they did stop long enough to eat some 'blue chips'....

We then took a walk around the 'reservoir' in Central Park. Officially named the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir, the Reservoir is famed for the 1.58 track that encircles the 106-acre body of water. This is a favorite jogging spot of many celebrities.....unfortunately strollers are not allowed on the jogging track (which must be a huge disappointment for those who have 'jogger strollers') so we had to take the track that ran just beside it and pop up onto the jogging track for checking out the scenery and trying to spot a celebrity or two (unsuccessfully).

 

Eloise is challenging my lead in the squirrel spotting competition - although I think that some of her squirrel 'sightings' are fakes! She did however spot a few slower creatures by the side of the reservior.

We made it right across the park and came out at the Guggenheim museum. The girls weren't interested in seeing art but they did like the building (mostly because of the guys selling ice-creams outside).

Dinner was at a typical 50's 'diner'..Big Daddy's......with the largest strawberry daiquiri I have ever had (for only $4.50!).

And my shoes held up very nicely!

New York - greenery scenery

Today was all about Central Park.

A slow morning led into a slow stroll through Central Park. Central Park is so big (it's 4km long and nearly 1km wide) that you probably couldn't walk along all of the paths that cris-cross all over the park in a single day.

We started out at West 72nd Street...at the corner where the Dakota building is. The Dakota building is famous as the home of John Lennon and Yoko Ono and is the site where he was shot. Across the road in Central Park is Strawberry Fields - a 'quiet' place to sit and contemplate the world (a rare thing in New York)....and the 'Imagine' mosaic created after John Lennon's death.

 Wandering through the park from here you come across 'the lake' - where you can hire a rowboat, and the Bow Bridge, which is popular for weddings and in many movies.

 Also in many movies is the Bethesda Terrace and and Angel of the Waters fountain, both of which were constructed in 1860-1870.

Behind the Bethesda Terrace is the "Mall"which gave us a lovely shady walk towards downtown after lunch of New York hotdogs...our squirrel sightings definitely increased today, with Eloise catching up in the squirrel spotting challenge!

 We found the carousel - which I had promised the girls a ride on the vintage (built in 1908) merry-go-round since we had left our apartment. Needless to say there were very excited to find it.

 We also discovered ANOTHER playground - this one is definitely the biggest we have seen. There is certainly no lack of play areas for the kids which is nice in such a busy and fast-paced city. 

Shane had a visit to the MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) today which he said was fantastic -Van Gogh's and Piccasso's a-plenty and I had a visit to Macy's department store....shoes and clothes a-plenty....

One last visit to the park for the day and Eloise wanted a turn under the fountain at the West 96 Street playground....