JO ANN’s Trip to London! First two days: March 30 to March 31, 2023

 This is a continuation summarizing my trip to UK and Ireland.  I had this neatly written up into one huge blog post, but unfortunately, Blogger auto save deleted a lot of it, so I’m going to try to salvage what I can of my originally blog post. 

On Thursday, March 30, 2023, Annabelle and Rebekah and I checked out of the very nice Leonardo Hotel in downtown Dublin, secured an Uber, and headed to the Dublin airport.  We had an afternoon plane scheduled that would take us to Heathrow Airport in London.

Rebekah had arranged an Airbnb in East London for the three of us.  We knew we wouldn’t arrive until that late afternoon-evening, so we knew we would not see any sites on our travel day.

The plane trip was quite pleasant.  After securing our luggage, we got in line for a cab.  We were told by the cab coordinator that our destination was quite far away, over an hour’s drive, and would be quite expensive, but we decided to just take a cab since I had so much luggage.  I always bring my scooter on trips and have never been great at “traveling light.”

The cab drive was really wonderful!  On the way, we says lots of London sites including Buckingham Palace and the Tower of London!  The cab was also so spacious and comfortable!  London cabs are way nicer than American cabs.  They are sort of like vans but bigger and more rectangular.  Most of our luggage was put inside the cab with us rather than in the front.  

After that very long cab ride, we finally arrived at our Airbnb.  It took a few minutes to open up the lockbox and get in to the building and get our luggage upstairs since there was no elevator, but once we were inside, we were so happy!

Photos from inside our East London Airbnb

We were actually staying in a young woman named Laura’s flat.  She Airbnb’s her flat when she goes out of town, so it wasn’t completely like a hotel, but very clean.  We had to move some things around for the three of us to be comfortable, but the place we just so cute!

Once we settled in a bit, we found a Lebanese restaurant and scooter-walked there.  Yes…my scooter sure comes in handy when I travel!

The food was so good and such a welcome to the three of us after our long travel day.

After dinner we went back to our Airbnb and pretty much went right to bed.  Annabelle and I shared the very comfortable queen bed that was in a little nook area of the studio flat and Rebekah slept on the very comfortable sleeper sofa. 

The next day, we chose a vegan breakfast place called Zealand and scooter-walked there.  I was so delighted with the neighborhood.  There were people of all nationalities around.  

The breakfast we had was just so fun too! 

Annabelle and Daniela

Annabelle’s friend from her gap year in Israel, Daniela, met us at Zealand and Daniela and Annabelle did some touring and shopping in the area of Liverpool Street together while Rebekah and I returned to the Airbnb.

 After a short rest and Rebekah washing her clothes in the washer that was in our Airbnb, Rebekah and I headed towards a place where there were Amazon lockers so I could pick up a

lock for my scooter that id ordered from Amazon.

It was fun to just walk in the Mile End area of East London and look at the houses, the people, and the sights. Unfortunately, atter we got the ScootLock. we messed up the combo at the coffee house I took Rebekah to for lunch, so we spent more time walking around bast London trying to find a place to return to Amazon.UK. 

   

Eventually, we were successful and then scooter-walked back to our Airbnb.

Annabelle and her friend Daniella spent the afternoon together and did some sight seeing and shopping. After Annabelle met us back at the Airbnb, we found a place where we were able to enjoy some great vegan pizza right in the neighborhood.

To be continued…..

 

JO ANN’s trip to Ireland! March 27 through March 30, 2023

This is a continuation of the story of my trip to the UK and Ireland.  The reason we went to Ireland was that my daughter Rebekah had been working in the UK for about six weeks and in order for her to spend more time there she needed to exit the country and return as a tourist.  Her boyfriend Garrett had to do the same thing, so we traveled together on a plane to Ireland on Monday, March 27, 2023.  Garrett found a hotel for all of us in Dublin for three nights.  Garrett actually stayed on two nights since he had his own adventure planned in Ireland.

We all didn’t arrive in Dublin until the evening I recall, so once we arrived at the Leonardo Hotel in downtown Dublin, we settled into our hotel rooms and decided to go out to dinner somewhere.  There was a bit of a mishap when the room Annabelle and I were assigned to had only one bed, but that was resolved quickly and we were moved to a room with two beds.

Most restaurants were not open by the time we began scooter-walking to dinner.  The place we wanted to go to wouldn’t seat us, but Garrett found another place and we had a very nice and quiet dinner together.  

Garrett really likes my scooter by the way!  I hope he gets one for his next tour!

Garrett and Rebekah

It was fun to get to know Garrett during the few meals we had together.  He is not a figure skater.  He’s a crew member that started as a concessions worker.  He’s from Oklahoma and he’d never met a figure skater until he began touring with the show.  He likes all the things our family enjoys: snowsports, biking, kayaking, stand up paddle boarding, hiking and the outdoors!  I look forward to getting to know him better and I sure like his long hair!

The next day, Tuesday, March 28, Rebekah and Garrett slept in, but Annabelle and I woke up earlier and looked for a coffee house since the hotel breakfast was no complimentary at this hotel.  Annabelle wanted to go to a famous art museum in Dublin so that was our goal of what to do.  

Our first breakfast in Ireland ended up being at a coffee house in a mall!

It was almost humorous because the coffee house we ended up at was in a mall very close to the hotel.  I don’t think our plan was for a coffee house in a mall, but we still had a nice time and then began scooter-walking towards the museum.  I was totally fascinated with the sights and took tons of photos!

Unfortunately, when we arrived at the Ireland National Art Gallery museum we were told I couldn’t bring my scooter inside.  That was really disappointing!  However, I just went to a nearby coffee house while Annabelle enjoyed the museum which had free admission.  I didn’t mind since I was suffering from jet lag.  It was good to just relax.  Once Annabelle was done at the museum we scooter-walked through the university that was very close by and got more wonderful photos.  We went from there down to an area along the water and got more photos.  Just scooter-walking around was fun and made us both happy.  We found a beautiful park that I enjoyed scootering around over and over again.  It was great to see the locals enjoying their life in Dublin.

The highlight of our day was finding the Cornucopia Vegan Restaurant.  The place was absolutely amazing!  We decided we just had to go back!

On Wednesday morning March 29, Garrett departed, so Rebekah moved into the room with me and Annabelle.  The three of us headed back to Cornucopia for breakfast.  We knew it had to be amazing and yes it was.  

Breakfast together at Cornucopia

Rebekah’s vegan breakfast

A very cool lighthouse at the art museum Annabelle and I visited

Rebekah was really exhausted and went back to the hotel, so Annabelle and decided to find a park and just enjoy more of Dublin.  We also “played tourist” and looked inside of many of the shops.  I was determined to get something green in Ireland!  Annabelle and I also visited a small art museum.

We also learned that Rebekah and Garrett had planed to go to the Guinness museum the day before, but were so exhausted that they slept in and skipped it. Instead they had gone to a huge park and rented bikes and had a very nice time.

I really wanted to go to that park and scooter, but instead Annabelle and I found another large park and just enjoyed ourselves.  Rebekah met us late for coffee.  We had the goal of returning to Cornucopia for dinner.  The place was just so good we HAD to go back!

So…we ate an early dinner together at Cornucopia of course. 

On the way home, Annabelle and I stopped in many souvenir shops.  I was in search for something GREEN!  I finally found the perfect knit green hat and a decorative collar for our dog Duchess that looked like it came from Scotland.  I had been sad that I had not bought Duchess a similar collar at Edinburgh Castle, so I was so delighted with both purchases!

The evening agenda was to go to an authentic Irish pub and that is what the three of us did!  I got my wish to do that and that really gave us a real Irish experience!  Rebekah and Garrett had gone there the night before.

And…wow…I got my Irish Pub experience!  The music was wonderful and so was the atmosphere.  I only had sparkling water to drink, but Rebekah and Annabelle enjoy beverages with alcohol.  

The next day was our last day in Dublin, Ireland, so I decided to treat the girls to the hotel breakfast buffet before we checked out of the hotel and took an Uber to the airport.  I didn’t think the breakfast was quite as good as the buffet they had at the Leonardo Hotel in Scotland, but it was still quite good.  The Scotland hotel even offered specialty coffee beverages, but the Irish hotel did not.  Also, I was so fascinated with the perfectly round poached eggs that were served at both hotels, but he Irish egg yolk was cooked more than the Scottish one.

We checked out at exactly the 11 am check out time since after breakfast we seemed to have been locked out of our room.  I think we were quite relieve to get in the Uber on time and get to the airport, but I think we were also sad we didn’t have time to see more of Ireland.

I knew I would miss both the Scottish and Irish accents I heard and all the nice people I met in Ireland and I’d especially miss the Cornucopia vegan restaurant since it was the best food I’d ever eaten anywhere.  

All went smoothly at the Dublin airport.  The three of us sat together on the plane and I believe we all dosed off a bit.  We were on our way to London!