Finally on my way

After a day delay, I finally made it across the pond. The downfall was that my rescheduled flight to Dublin was to arrive at 5:15 am (which is 12:15 am EST). This not only made it even harder to adjust to the time difference, but got me to Ireland when there was absolutely nothing going on. However, it did provide the opportunity to experience something that is extremely unusual. I saw a sunrise, a sunset, and another sunrise all within an hour.
At nearly 40,000 ft in the plane you could see far enough east to see the sunrise earlier than normal. But then as we decended to sea level, the sun actually set again. It was pretty cool to watch. Then less than an later when I left the airport, the normal sunrise in Dublin happened. So hopefully there is a good side like this to ever unfavorable situation that may arise on this trip.

I also met my first friend at this way too early time. I rode the bus from the airport into the city center with a girl headed back from the Univ of Michigan to her home in London. She had a very long layover in Dublin, so was going to explore the city. We wandered around together looking for a coffee shop to pass the time until the city woke up. I even had a cafe latte. Seeing that I was in Europe, I thought I would embrass the true coffee shop experience.

Then, in order to truly kick of the trip on the right foot, what better to do in Ireland......tour the Guinness Brewery and have your first 'Perfectly Poured Pint' by 10 am. The pints continued to flow for the rest of the day.