Warm Adventures: The luck of the Irish?

My brother, the center of attention

So it was bound to happen. I mean we've had a really good streak of awesome vacations. We've been many places and seen amazing things, the bar had been set pretty high. Unfortunately, this is not one of those great travel stories. This was a long planned vacation to visit my brother (A), his wife (Auntie C) and their little boy (Little A) while they were living in Ireland for 6 months. The tripped was planned late last year before they moved and centered around us all visiting Edinburgh for the long holiday weekend.

Dublin (perhaps if we had skipped this picture)

Things weren't off to a really great start as Alison came down with the 3 day fever, 2 days before we left. She was actually doing better on travel day and by day 2 of our vacation she was 100% better. But let's jump back to Day 1 - the plan was to drop our bags and kids with my brother so that Erik and I could hit the Guinness Storehouse. By the time we got the kids settled, the sun had come out and we decided to walk along the river. We lost track of time, enjoying our kidless stroll in Dublin and stopping here and there along the way. A beautiful walk, the only problem was we arrived 4 minutes after the Guinness storehouse closed. Ugh - well at least we still had two more days in Dublin.

Coast of Bray

On Day 2 my brother took us out to the coast. It was a beautiful day and the kids enjoyed tossing rocks in the ocean and playing at the playground. We didn't quite make it to the top of Bray as a wicked storm was rolling in but a fun day nonetheless. That night we enjoyed a delicious dinner with my brother and Auntie C at a wonderful restaurant. Unfortunately, Day 3 arrived with half of our party having a bit of a stomach bug. Not good as we were scheduled to fly to Edinburgh that evening. Since we were well, Ali and I high tailed it out of the sick house and did a bit of shopping at Penney's before we were called back to decide the fate of the rest of our vacation. Although those with the stomach bug were feeling better, my brother and family decided to stay put as they had company arriving in a few days and felt it better to get their flat in order.

At coast in Bray

Edinburgh castle

Although a bit reluctant and sad, we decided to take our chances and hop over to Scotland to salvage what was left of our vacation. Come to realize that Auntie C had done all the legwork and research for us complete with booking tours and restaurants. Those plans were thrown out the window since they involved having two couples on deck, one to watch kids and one to tour or eat out. Since we had done little to no research on Edinburgh, we arrived a bit clueless as to what to do for our 3.5 days there. The tours out to the Highlands and Loch Ness didn't allow for children under 3, even if they were just shy of turning 3. So we did touristy things, i.e. castle, museums, coffee bars, hop on hop off bus ride and Arthur's Hill. We had some great meals at this cute little cafe around the corner from our apartment and stumbled across an awesome BBQ joint. We made the most of it and got to experience lots of Edinburgh. It's just that we aren't the city type of travelers, we would've liked to have see the countryside also.

To top off the whole sad story, in addition to some other icky things that happened on Monday, I got food poisoning and spent our last night in Dublin (layover at airport hotel) in the bathroom. Let's just say I have never been more happy to be back in Switzerland - the weather was warm and my bed so comforting. Yes this trip was a bit lackluster. I had really hoped to spend more time with my brother and his family as we don't get to see them very often when we are stateside. We also had hoped to see a lot more of Dublin and Scotland. I guess you can't win them all and on the bright side, we can always come back. Next time.