Lost in Dublin

Ireland - Day 1
My vacation began with a rocky start. As I groggily walked off the plane at 5:30 AM, I was abruptly brought to my senses by the passport guy barking at me because I hadn't filled out a lodging card on the plane.

Then I got my car. If they had secretly filmed me I could have been a wonderful car commercial. Imagine an Irish accented voice saying, "To prove how durable our vehicles are we gave one to an untraveled, directionally-challenged American girl functioning on only two hours of sleep and let her loose in Dublin to find her hotel. Let's see how the car fared."

First, a bicyclist ran into the door. "No harm done," he said. "Just a bit of rubber from the handlebars on the door."

Second, I clipped a taxi cab with my passenger side mirror. The taxi driver came up. "No harm done. You just hit the mirror," he said flipping the mirror back into place.

Third, I clipped a bus with the same mirror. This time the mirror flipped in and the actual mirror popped out.

Fourth, I couldn't find my hotel thanks to one-way roads, hidden street signs, and my lack of maps. I did however see all of the greater Dublin area at least 4 or 5 times.

Fifth, I couldn't find reverse. Who would have thought that you had to do something other than put it into gear?

After 8 hours of driving around Dublin, I pulled into my hotel, parked my car and began checking out the city. My time was limited due to my keystone cop driving adventures, but I at least had a chance to realize that Dublin isn't such a bad city provided you aren't in a car.