We just got back from the ABD Emerald Isle tour. The day before we left, my wife posted a question about laundry facilities in the hotels, and there were a couple of requests for a trip report from responders. So, in the interests of full disclosure, here it is. First, to answer the question about laundry facilities, none of the hotels has any, so unless youre prepared to pay the valet service to do laundry for you, youd better pack enough for at least a week.
We flew out of Harrisburg, PA, at 6:30 the evening of Wednesday, September 17, for an overnight flight to Dublin via Philly. I saw somewhere else on the board where someone was asking about prices for these; I cant speak for anyone else, but we paid just over $800 each on US Airways, which seems like a good price to me. Of course, we booked back in February, just as soon as we knew we were going, because from the standpoint of price, earlier is better. Also, we were flush with DVC points, so we ponied up enough points each to make the trip. Again, earlier reservations were better, because the regular rate was, I believe, about 33 points per person higher. Also, with the dollar dropping all summer, 2009 rates have gone up to 428 for early booking and 471 for regular, so youll definitely want to book early if youre using DVC points, and even if youre paying, early booking is, I believe, cheaper.
Also, we found the best flights for us but had Disney book them so we could have all our vacation insurance through them. Also when youre first planning the trip, you might want to consider booking flights arriving 1 day before and staying 1 day after. Several of our tour mates did that, and it seemed to work out well, well enough that we wish we had done it, too. You should still be able to get with Disney prices, and they will still pick up and drive you to the airport.
Anyway, we landed in Dublin just after 8:00 and, after a 45-minute processing queue through immigration and customs, we met one of our tour guides, Sarah, with two other couples and our driver, who drove us to the Westin Dublin. (This was the last tour of the year, which is designated as no children, so there were none.) Our room wasnt guaranteed to be available until 2:00 that afternoon, so although we were hoping it would be ready for us to get cleaned up, it wasnt. There, we met our other tour guide, Courtney. More about them later, but Sarah and Courtney were terrific guides. I havent met any of the other guides, and Im sure that, since this is a Disney trip, theyre all first-rate, but if you can get Courtney and Sarah, youd be doing yourself a big favor. They really made the trip a great one for all of us.
Since we hadnt eaten much on the flight, we ate at Gallaghers Boxty House on Fleet Street, about 2 blocks from the hotel. Thanks to Angie Watt for that recommendation; we read Angies Ireland trip report post from a couple of months ago and found it very useful. A boxty is an Irish pancake made with potatoes, and is used to wrap a variety of food Irish-style. In our case, we both got the small traditional Irish breakfasts, because it was, after all, 11:00 Dublin time and 6:00 our time on Thursday morning. The traditional Irish breakfast consists of fried eggs on a boxty, sausage, Irish bacon which is much more like strips of Virginia ham (salty), and toast, and it ran us about 22 euros, which included coffee at about 2.50 euros each and a 10% tip. The large traditional at Gallaghers would have also included black and white pudding, which are mixed sausage products that reminded me somewhat of the scrapple we get here in central PA. We saw a lot of traditional Irish breakfast items at each of the hotel buffets we ate at, so it pays to get familiar with them. Most of the buffets also featured creamy oatmeal (porridge) and horrible coffee. At least we thought the coffee was horrible; just add lots of cream and sugar. We also stopped at the ATM right outside the Westin to get euros for the items we couldnt or didnt want to charge.
As tired as we were, having gotten only a couple of hours sleep on the flight to Dublin, we hung in there until the welcoming dinner at 6:00. We walked around Dublin and saw the sights, which was easy to do due to the central location of the Westin. The weather was almost perfect, as it was throughout the week. Someone told me the weather in Ireland is rainy, but you wouldnt be able to prove it based on what we saw. We saw the Bloody Sunday Post Office where the 1916 revolution started and the monuments surrounding it on OConnell Drive, and then walked back towards the Temple Bar pub district and continued on to Christ Church Cathedral. Surprisingly, the cathedral, which is Church of Ireland (Anglican) and not Catholic, was charging 6 euros to tour the building, so we passed on that. St. Patricks Cathedral, also Church of Ireland, was being renovated and had scaffolding around the outside, so we passed on that also and walked back to the hotel. We checked out the shops along the way, particularly Carrolls, which has probably the most reasonable prices on tourist gifts in Dublin, but we kept in mind the advice of the Irish lad who drove us from the airport to the Westin: save your shopping for the provinces, because they have better prices than the ones in Dublin. More on that later. If anyone is interested in pictures, by the way, you can find them at:
[Sorry, tried to post this and was told by the sysadmin I can't post links unless I have at least 10 posts. I'll figure out how to get it in there. Stand by.]
The welcoming dinner at the Westin was probably the best meal we had on the trip. I particularly liked the lamb, which was served in some kind of wine and spice sauce, and the cheesecake, which was much lighter and sweeter than the American variety. Courtney and Sarah had all sorts of get-acquainted games for us to play, which were probably part of the Disney tour template, but they had a way of making even the most mundane activities (such as this one) fun where they could have been, well, annoying. Anyway, I have to admit that I didnt learn a lot of our fellow tourists names until the last couple of days. Anyway, having sucked it up and stayed awake until bed time, we crashed early to get on Ireland time.
We flew out of Harrisburg, PA, at 6:30 the evening of Wednesday, September 17, for an overnight flight to Dublin via Philly. I saw somewhere else on the board where someone was asking about prices for these; I cant speak for anyone else, but we paid just over $800 each on US Airways, which seems like a good price to me. Of course, we booked back in February, just as soon as we knew we were going, because from the standpoint of price, earlier is better. Also, we were flush with DVC points, so we ponied up enough points each to make the trip. Again, earlier reservations were better, because the regular rate was, I believe, about 33 points per person higher. Also, with the dollar dropping all summer, 2009 rates have gone up to 428 for early booking and 471 for regular, so youll definitely want to book early if youre using DVC points, and even if youre paying, early booking is, I believe, cheaper.
Also, we found the best flights for us but had Disney book them so we could have all our vacation insurance through them. Also when youre first planning the trip, you might want to consider booking flights arriving 1 day before and staying 1 day after. Several of our tour mates did that, and it seemed to work out well, well enough that we wish we had done it, too. You should still be able to get with Disney prices, and they will still pick up and drive you to the airport.
Anyway, we landed in Dublin just after 8:00 and, after a 45-minute processing queue through immigration and customs, we met one of our tour guides, Sarah, with two other couples and our driver, who drove us to the Westin Dublin. (This was the last tour of the year, which is designated as no children, so there were none.) Our room wasnt guaranteed to be available until 2:00 that afternoon, so although we were hoping it would be ready for us to get cleaned up, it wasnt. There, we met our other tour guide, Courtney. More about them later, but Sarah and Courtney were terrific guides. I havent met any of the other guides, and Im sure that, since this is a Disney trip, theyre all first-rate, but if you can get Courtney and Sarah, youd be doing yourself a big favor. They really made the trip a great one for all of us.
Since we hadnt eaten much on the flight, we ate at Gallaghers Boxty House on Fleet Street, about 2 blocks from the hotel. Thanks to Angie Watt for that recommendation; we read Angies Ireland trip report post from a couple of months ago and found it very useful. A boxty is an Irish pancake made with potatoes, and is used to wrap a variety of food Irish-style. In our case, we both got the small traditional Irish breakfasts, because it was, after all, 11:00 Dublin time and 6:00 our time on Thursday morning. The traditional Irish breakfast consists of fried eggs on a boxty, sausage, Irish bacon which is much more like strips of Virginia ham (salty), and toast, and it ran us about 22 euros, which included coffee at about 2.50 euros each and a 10% tip. The large traditional at Gallaghers would have also included black and white pudding, which are mixed sausage products that reminded me somewhat of the scrapple we get here in central PA. We saw a lot of traditional Irish breakfast items at each of the hotel buffets we ate at, so it pays to get familiar with them. Most of the buffets also featured creamy oatmeal (porridge) and horrible coffee. At least we thought the coffee was horrible; just add lots of cream and sugar. We also stopped at the ATM right outside the Westin to get euros for the items we couldnt or didnt want to charge.
As tired as we were, having gotten only a couple of hours sleep on the flight to Dublin, we hung in there until the welcoming dinner at 6:00. We walked around Dublin and saw the sights, which was easy to do due to the central location of the Westin. The weather was almost perfect, as it was throughout the week. Someone told me the weather in Ireland is rainy, but you wouldnt be able to prove it based on what we saw. We saw the Bloody Sunday Post Office where the 1916 revolution started and the monuments surrounding it on OConnell Drive, and then walked back towards the Temple Bar pub district and continued on to Christ Church Cathedral. Surprisingly, the cathedral, which is Church of Ireland (Anglican) and not Catholic, was charging 6 euros to tour the building, so we passed on that. St. Patricks Cathedral, also Church of Ireland, was being renovated and had scaffolding around the outside, so we passed on that also and walked back to the hotel. We checked out the shops along the way, particularly Carrolls, which has probably the most reasonable prices on tourist gifts in Dublin, but we kept in mind the advice of the Irish lad who drove us from the airport to the Westin: save your shopping for the provinces, because they have better prices than the ones in Dublin. More on that later. If anyone is interested in pictures, by the way, you can find them at:
[Sorry, tried to post this and was told by the sysadmin I can't post links unless I have at least 10 posts. I'll figure out how to get it in there. Stand by.]
The welcoming dinner at the Westin was probably the best meal we had on the trip. I particularly liked the lamb, which was served in some kind of wine and spice sauce, and the cheesecake, which was much lighter and sweeter than the American variety. Courtney and Sarah had all sorts of get-acquainted games for us to play, which were probably part of the Disney tour template, but they had a way of making even the most mundane activities (such as this one) fun where they could have been, well, annoying. Anyway, I have to admit that I didnt learn a lot of our fellow tourists names until the last couple of days. Anyway, having sucked it up and stayed awake until bed time, we crashed early to get on Ireland time.
