Dublin - Day 1

What a day to start our trip! We landed safely in Dubkin right on time, made it through customs with no problems and everyone had their luggage! We then met our Tour Director Chloe, who got both SLHS groups together. We then decided to head to our "coach" or bus, however, as we left, Mr. Ben Sever decided he wanted to stick around the airport a bit longer than everyone else. Without going into to much detail here, Ben found himself left at the airport. But danger was averted as he did what he should have, which is to stand right there and wait for us to get him (which took a call to the airport, them finding him, and then him getting into a taxi to get to the hotel).

Meanwhile, the rest of the group made their way to the hotel (very nice!) and we dropped off our luggage. We then got back onto the bus to head into downtown Dublin for a quick walking tour and lunch! We had some delicious sandwiches from a cool cafe on one of the major pedestrian streets, Grafton Street. After lunch we walked around a bit looking at the major sites of Dublin, such as Trinity College, St. Stephen's Green, the Millennium Spire among others. We crossed the Liffey River, the major river running through the city.

We headed back to the hotel for dinner (vegetable soup, chicken and rice, apple crumble) and then had a few brief meetings as a big group and then in our respective smaller groups.

The kids overall are doing great and are quickly learning the ins and outs of international travel, such as look both ways before crossing one-way streets as people may be driving on the "wrong side of the road"! They were pretty exhausted throughout the day and I think will be much more energetic come tomorrow. Speaking of tomorrow, we are headed back downtown where we will get a personal tour from a city guide of many of the places we saw today. We should see St. Patrick’s Cathedral, as well as the Book of Kells. We have some of the afternoon off to shop and explore before eating dinner and then heading to a traditional Irish singing and dancing show. I know some of the kids are quite eager to learn a new dance!

That’s all for now! Hopefully will update you again tomorrow, but it will be a late night so no promises! Thanks for your prayers as we traveled and we look forward to new adventures tomorrow!  Mr. C