Wednesday, January 8

We have had some nice sunny days although it is raining now. I walked to the Wednesday “gypsy” market this morning – a nice chilly and windy early jaunt. When I arrived, they were just setting up and seemed to be in no rush. I guess the crowds show up later in the morning and not at the 8am opening, as I did. I got some nice warm sweatpants for 5€.

I’ve been swimming every day which is wonderful. The facility is nice and the pool is top-notch. I feel lucky it’s so close to where we are staying.

I also feel lucky that this city is so walkable. I don’t count my steps, but they’re certainly over 10,000/day.

[view from my walk earlier]

[ Christmas village is packed away]

Monday, January 6

This morning I checked out the municipal pool and it’s perfect so I got a membership and happily swam some laps. It’s a busy place with all sorts of classes going on seemingly all day, every day.

We walked for an hour, and the Alsace region is bustling for off-season. The weather is perfect, 68° and sunny after a rainy Sunday. Nice day for a bakery stop and a view of the sand alligator.

Tuesday: Dalkey

 

20191001_132526This morning’s weather was rainy, windy, cold, and generally miserable. We still followed through with our plan to go to Dalkey, a suburb of Dublin that is about a half-hour train ride from Dublin.

My cousin lives there (she is in the U.S. for a few weeks so we had to change our plans to spend a few days there this week) and so does Van Morrison, Bono, Sinead O’Connor, and some other interesting people. Dalkey is a charming city and even though we were not going to stay there, it was still worth checking out.

Or was it?

The walk to the Dublin train station was a bit of a struggle with the wind but we got there eventually and didn’t have to wait long for a train.

Once in Dalkey, it seemed to be even colder, windier, and it continued to rain as we walked into town.

We were content to sit in a warm, dry coffee shop for a while and then left and tried to enjoy the shops on the main street.

Eventually we had some delicious seafood chowder and decided to go back to Dublin. It was not the best day to visit Dalkey. The train on the way back was delayed for an hour because of the weather and I was grateful we were sitting in it rather than waiting on the platform.

Eventually we realized that the train we were on aas not going to our intended destination, so we got off and waited for another one – frustrating.

We walked back to our hotel and have a fun dinner with our Ireland-based niece near where we are staying. This salvaged our otherwise cold day.

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