Ireland Baby!

We made it safe and sound to Ireland!!

We took the train to O'Hare and we were so excited to get our honeymoon started that we left way early! That's ok though! O'Hare is a big airport so it took us a while to find our way to the International Terminal then to figure out where to eat, etc.

I was so excited at the airport to have a plane ticket to Ireland and be using my new passport!! Yay!

We were originally going to be flying into Shannon Airport because we're spending our first 2 days in Limerick, but Aer Lingus cancelled the direct flight to Shannon. So, we flew into Dublin! The flight wasn't too long though, only about 6.5 hours. Not bad at all. Plus the plane was pretty nice! Each seat had its own tv screen and there were movie and tv show choices to watch as well as games you could play. Plus, we got dinner and breakfast! I was not expected that...so it was an added bonus! Here is a shot of the view as we were approaching Dublin. Amazing!

When we arrived in Shannon we picked up the rental car. The scariest part of this honeymoon for me! Well...I did it! I managed to drive on the wrong side of the road, on the wrong side of the car, shifting with the wrong hand with Reverse right beside 1st gear instead of 5th gear! Crazy!! Shawn got a lot of video of my first experience driving in Ireland...I'm sure he'll be sharing that when we get home! The drivers in Ireland have made me feel right at home though. They use their horns more than people in Chicago and they never use turn signals or seem to obey most traffic laws. It has been an experience already, plus we hit a few patches of construction too. Just our luck! There are a ton of roundabouts here too...I don't think there has been even one regular intersection. I'm doing pretty well though! We did manage to find our hotel in the end.

We will be here in Limerick City for two nights (but seeing as it is 6 hours ahead of Chicago here, we are already heading to bed and it is only 1pm Chicago time...but 7pm here!). We went for a little walk around town already after we got to Limerick and stopped in at a pub. Shawn got to have his first official Guiness from Ireland! He was pretty excited about that. He said it tasted the same as home, but we're not in Dublin yet so maybe that's why. I had a Heineken on tap and it was delicious! Much better than the stuff from home! We also went to dinner at a pub called Dolan's. It was so good! They have live music every night, but we couldn't stay up tonight for that! We think we'll head back tomorrow night for the live music. Shawn had the roast chicken special for dinner and I had a traditional Irish Stew. Yummy! I know it's early, but I am EXHAUSTED! We'll be up early tomorrow for a full day of Limerick City tourism! I'll keep you posted!