Venice to Dublin

I am not going to lie - there is something to be said about being in a place where everyone speaks your language - there is definetly something a little more relaxing about Ireland and I know it is not totally due to the language difference but that is a nice perk.

Dublin reminds me a bit of San Francisco...the people are friendly, the weather is cold but something is cozy about it at the same time. Although the similarites are there, there is one major difference - the amount of time spent in pubs. I mean, I had heard that visiting Ireland was half about visiting the pubs and meeting the people but part of me couldn't imagine how true this really is. It has, I guess stereotypically so, been raining and cold pretty much the hold time here so far so we stopped into a pub for a tea (for me) and a pint (for Hoyt) on Saturday at about 1 pm and it was amazing - the place was packed and I mean wall to wall and this is beside the fact that there is a pub on every corner...Needless to say, Hoyt and I are loving it.

Beside pub hopping, we have also visited a few writer musuems and exhibits which has been one of my favorite parts of the trips...I love hearing about great writers and their stories, how they came to be, what their inspirations were and their eccentricities...I didn't realize that Bram Stoker was from Ireland for instance...we visited the Guiness storehouse and have really enjoyed the fish and chips, stuffed pies and stews...food is always one of the best memories...on top of it all, my sister was kind enough to use her points to score us rooms in a westin here and we are trying to convince ourselves after 3 days of 1000 threadcount sheets and fluffy robes that the little hotels off the beaten path are much more cozy but somehow it is like the coke bottle and gods must be crazy and once the bottle drops, it is hard to experience things in the same light...we are off tomorrow to the coast and to galway where our biking adventure begins...yeah!!!