Dublin, Ireland – 04/25 – 04/26

(Michelle) First order of business… find a place to stay. With our big bags, we walked up Gardiner street to find an array of B&Bs. We picked one we had seen in the LP guide and went with it. That night we went on the musical pub crawl. Irish music played at 3 different bars. TJ had been on this tour before, but he thought I would like it and I did. I was afraid at first to break into the world of drinking Guinness, but at the second pub, I asked the bartender if he had any pale ales and he said “do you mean pale in color? No.” Ok, I’ll have a Guinness. Breakfast at the B&B… Bacon, eggs and sausage… familiar and yet they all taste a little different. Can’t say I didn’t miss the hometown bacon a bit. We moved on Friday to a hostel in town… Jacob’s Inn. We got a private room (not dorm style) which ended up costing us more than the B&B… go figure. We went to the Ireland National Museum. What I learned at the Museum:
1) Dead people buried in bogs can be preserved for thousands of years.
2) It is illegal to use a metal detector in Ireland. Good thing I couldn’t fit that in my bag.
We then went to the Guinness Storehouse/Brewery. We learned more about malted hops and barley. Then we drank some. We wanted to find some local music… Thursday nights at the Cobblestone are well known for that. We got a little taste of it there, but it wasn’t exactly what we had in mind. We did meet a really drunk local man who rubbed my head (for good luck??) and made me and my "hubby" take a sip of his Guinness before he slammed it.

(TJ) Guinness is good.

New York – 04/22 – 04/23

(Michelle) Sunday we decided to go to lower Manhattan. We started out at Ground Zero, we then walked back up through Times Square and headed to the docks of the Circle Line. We took the sunset cruise around Lower Manhattan. Nikki, are those airplane bottles in your sock? Oh right, Beth’s idea. After a lovely cruise around lower Manhattan, we did a mini- pub crawl (ok, it was only one bar in between) back up to Beth’s neighborhood… where we went to the Parlour for some karaoke. Beth’s song, Purple Rain. TJ’s song, Suspicious Minds, Nikki and Eric – they thoroughly analyzed the book, but never made it up. Matt – newer to the sport, joined in after he realized that they had his song all along. After trying out some Cranberries (a request from “Kenny” based on my new hair-do), I moved on to some Norah Jones, much to TJ’s dismay. “Why are you doing this to me???” Monday we checked out the Natural History museum. They had a lot of information on the Homo Erectus (pre Homo Sapian). How about a round of dirty water hot dogs from the street vender after an afternoon at the museum… TJ threw his out half way through due to an unknown substance that he bit into. Dinner - Half price sushi night at the Hi Life – Beth’s place of employment. The post dinner drink was at the bar across the street from Hi Life, the “Crossroads” or the Crossro, if you base it on the letters lit up. Nikki insisted on a round of Irish drinks to celebrate our upcoming departure.

(TJ) Note to self: do not wear new sandals when walking 50 city blocks in one day. Do bring windbreaker when going out on water at night. Do not eat hot dogs off of city venders and then be surprised to find undistinguishable meat chunks. Do make sure that you have enough to drink before you start singing Elvis or duets.

New York – 04/20 – 04/21

(Michelle) Beth had to work on Friday so TJ and I went to the Met. We saw priceless works of art. The updated Greek and Roman exhibit opened today, so I guess we timed that pretty well. We also saw an Egyptian temple, Furniture from America – 1800s, and paintings by Van Gogh, Cassat, Homer and others. I believe TJ’s favorite section to be the “Arms and Armor” rooms, whereas I really enjoyed the musical instruments rooms. The Met is on the other side of Central Park from Beth and Matt’s place, so we enjoyed a nice stroll through the park on the way there and back. There are so many kids in this park. We had dinner with Matt at Nona’s (Italian), we picked up Beth from work and hit a couple of bars. On Saturday, Eric and Nikki arrived and we went out for tapas.

New York – 04/18 – 04/19

(Michelle) Wednesday: The start of the trip was definitely trying to prepare us for future travel woes. Hour delay on the plane, hour delay to get luggage, hour and a half wait for the super shuttle to pick us up. Finally we were on our way to the upper west side of Manhattan, where Beth and Matt live. Beth is a friend of mine from St. Olaf. Beth and her boyfriend Matt are letting us stay with them during our time in New York. When we finally arrived at their place, we were hungry. Food - First dinner in New York was at the Chinese Restaurant that gives out free wine with dinner (a Beth and Matt neighborhood favorite). People Watching – Crazy guy sitting next to us at the Chinese Restaurant asked me if I knew what an Ole/Onion meant (we couldn’t understand which he was referencing, as we had said both the words Ole and Onion during the course of our meal).

Thursday: New York Yankees vs. Cleveland Indians – 1pm day game. Matt = Yankee’s fan, Beth = Yankees hater. Cleveland winning 6 to 2 in the 9th with 2 outs when ex-cub Joe Borowski gives it up… in the end, A – Rod, 0 -4 going into the 9th, hits a walk off homerun to win the game. I was indifferent on the teams, but that was a pretty good ending. That evening, we watched the sun set on top of Beth and Matt’s building, and then we ordered in some New York pizza.

(TJ) Yankee Stadium reminded me of Comisky Park in Chicago before they retrofitted the place to have any character. Apparently it has been updated so many times it in no way resembles an old park like Wrigley or Fenway. It was like the Metrodome that Ruth built. Other than that it was a great game with a great rally from the best team that money can buy.

Disclaimer....

These blogs are the facts and opinions as we have seen them on these travels! Please do not read any of them as a history lesson or even that we are now the experts on any topic (although TJ might actually be the expert on some of the war history stuff) . I'm sure many of you have more information on various topics (please comment on an entry if so!) but these are just from the perspective that we are seeing them.

Read these as if you are hearing our voices in your head - but not like Joan of Arc's voices in her head, as our voices are not coming from a divine being, at least not directly.

Not that anyone has complained or anything...

We are cannot be held responsible for the length of the blog or your boredom while reading them, as we just can't help ourselves. :)