Swords, near Dublin- Monday, August 12, 2013

There's good news and bad news about the laundry.  The good news is that this will be our last load before coming home, and there finally a washer and dryer available to us in a hotel.  The bad news is that the dryer seems to be misnamed.  It doesn't seem to actually do any drying.  Julie was up at 6:00 in order to get the laundry done before a day of touring.  We had gone to McDonald's for breakfast while we were waiting.  By 12:00, the dryer was still spinning and many of our clothes were still damp.  

We hung the clothes around the room and decided to burn the day at something that wouldn't burn us out.  We found a movie theater a few blocks from the hotel where we are in Swords, near the Dublin Airport.  We got a quick lunch at a cafe in the mall before the show started and saw "Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters."  It was pretty good, but it certainly helps if you know a little bit of Greek mythology.  

After the movie we walked the mall- the Swords Palisades.  The girls were so excited, you'd have thought that they'd never been in a mall before.  Anna bought some tops at H&M, and Scott bought a best of the Dubliners CD set.  Emma bought a family of toy seals.  Seals seem to be the favorite animal of the girls now because of Molly.  We also did some shopping at Superquinn, the grocery store in the mall, to get some snacks and tomorrow's breakfast.  There was a "train" that was traveling around the upper floor of the mall, giving little kids rides, but it wasn't running on any track.  It was a novelty, but our girls were a little big for it.  They were happy shopping.  When we came back to the hotel, we could easily spot our room from the pants hanging in the window.  We walked to TGI Friday's for dinner.  

It was a very non-stressful day, once we resigned ourselves to wearing a few damp clothes and having some more hung around the room.  It was a much needed little break from the vacation.  We've been having fun, but we've been running ourselves ragged.  (Last Saturday, we were actually looking into coming home a few days early, if it was possible, but the flights we're on are locked in as charters.  Even so, we're not happy with how the AAA people handled our phone calls.)  Today has recharged our batteries and we're ready to hit Dublin City tomorrow.