Day 1: Ireland!

Two Long-time Wishes Finally Realized

What a long day! Thirty six hours from start to finish, but I’m not complaining. We started our day with Jim & Corie kindly dropping us out to the ferry, and with the help of the bus/metro we made it to YVR with about 4 hours to spare. The simple solution was to hang out in one of the airport lounges in the international area. Things were going nicely until we started getting texts from Air Canada advising that our seats have been changed. I went down to see if I could find someone to talk to you about ‘our’ problem. After a long look around I finally found a nice lady who listened to my problem and then explained that we had likely been bumped by somebody who paid more for their ticket. We had picked up our seats on sale. There was some confusion as to whether or not Bryan and I would be sitting together, but in the end, it turned out that we were. We were also joined by a nice Irish fellow who is now living in Vancouver.

In any event, we survived our seats in the back of the plane, the food and even managed to get a little sleep. After passing through passport control we exited the airport and picked up a taxi across town so that we could get ourselves fitted for our wedding tuxedos.

Now carrying our bags and two tuxedos we picked up another taxi into the centre of Dublin where we were able to drop all our gear at the hotel. We still had hours until we could access our hotel room. So it was off to walk central Dublin, something I had done several times before, but Bryan had not yet experienced.

It was a rare sunny day in Ireland this summer, and people were out in numbers shopping and enjoying themselves.

Part of the reason that there was so many people on the streets was because England had brought their football team to town for the first time in many years to play the Irish national team. There were signs of it everywhere throughout the day.

We walked around, passed and through many iconic areas, including Trinity College and Saint Stevens Green, but eventually I started getting a bit hungry. Knowing that we were going to be out late without an opportunity for dinner, we found a pub and of course enjoyed the aforementioned Guinness Which I remembered to dedicate to a close friend of mine. The pub was called the Hogs Head which was small but ok. The food was no hell, but the mascot was kind of fun!

By just about 2 PM we are both starting to drag a little bit, and decided to walk back to our hotel to see if there was any chance of getting in before the 3 PM check-in time.

Thanks to Bryan‘s research, we now know that there used to be an Admiral Nelson column on the spot which was bombed by the IRA in the 1960s. This was a replacement as part of the millennium replanning and development of O’Connell Street. 

We lucked out and a nice French woman at reception let us into our room for 2 PM. After a quick shower, we headed off again into the afternoon heat to see the main event, the Ireland, England, international football game!

We decided to walk, mostly because our brains were too addled to figure out the transit system, and I thought it might be fun to join the crowd as they move towards the stadium. As we got closer, the crowd increased significantly, as did the police presence.

As you might imagine, there’s no love lost between these two countries. A long and difficult history which simmers just below the surface. At an event like this, feelings become expressed and some in the crowd are brought to a boil. I think one can only really understand the nature of the distrust by being born here. This is my fourth travel to Ireland going back to extended visits in 1975 and 1981 when the so-called ‘troubles’ were in full swing. Fortunately, a lot has changed for the better since those days, but at an event like this the old feelings come to the surface and are loudly vocalized.

I had purchased the tickets a couple of months ago, but not being clear how to get into the stadium we followed along behind the crowd hoping to find the right entrance. I knew which side of this beautiful stadium we had to enter from, but we failed to see any signage directing us there. When I stopped to ask a couple of police officers during our hunt, they kept sending us in the same direction with assurances that this was the correct path. This ultimately turned out to be the wrong way, but in the end it didn’t really matter. We were treated to quite the experience as we tried to find her way through ever increasing crowds Who are chanting ever increasingly negative English rhetoric

It was a good thing that we left our hotel early to get to the stadium. With our misdirection and the massive crowds to work our way through we just managed to get into the stadium in time for kick off.

We are treated to some really fun football. The Irish came out aggressively to start, and there was pushing and shoving between players at the beginning which inflamed the fans. We had a clown sitting two seats down for me who is on his feet the entire time, swearing and screaming at the top of his lungs. he was in adult and should’ve behaved better because there were lots of children around. There is always one nut in every crowd. However, he seemed to entertain Bryan and I throughout the game. One of the reasons I really wanted to attend the game was to experience the spirit of these football matches. I think I got a little little more than I was expecting.!😂

This is the English section, and after the game was over, they were instructed to sit in their seats until the stadium had been emptied. As as typical in these matches, the fans are surrounded by police officers throughout the game. The last time these two teams met in 1995 there was basically rioting in the stands. At Paul’s suggestion we sat a long way from the England section!

England scored two quick goals in the first 20 minutes which quieted the audience down considerably. The score ended that way, and as we walked back to our hotel we noticed that there were a number of police officers on horses. Bryan found online that they were used last night to separate the Irish fans from the English fans where we had walked slightly earlier. Anyway, I would call the whole experience a huge success! We had a really good time and saw the cultural experience that I had been looking for as well. We were home and dead asleep by 10pm!

This morning, I was fully awake by 8 o’clock and hung out waiting for Bryan to wake up so that we could find some breakfast. We eventually found breakfast at noon!

We went for a nice walk through the centre area again.

The only site that we entered was Dublin Castle, which was pretty interesting.

Many famous people have stayed in the apartments over the years, including Queen Elizabeth, Queen Victoria, President Kennedy, Benjamin Franklin, O’Connell, Charles Dickens, Nelson Mandela and many others. I thought it would make a great hostal!😉

After this, we kind of worked our way back to the hotel. And we are still hanging out here with under 2 hours until bed time.

Early tomorrow morning, we will take a taxi back out to the airport to pick up a car because we’re carrying these large suit bags which look kind of funny with our travel packs. We have changed our plans and will now meet Erin who will hopefully fly in on time on the same flight that we came in on, and the three of us will drive up through Northern Ireland together on our way to our destination of Buncrana. I hear there’s a wedding there!

Geoff