First day in Ireland and pub challenges #2 and #3

Luebeck airport is seriously poxy. I am not kidding when I say it's little more than a tent -  the roof is just rubber sheeting stretched over a metal frame, and the floor looks like a makeshift dancefloor. But again, that doesn't bother me one lick, and nor does Ryan Air's equally poxy planes - they are even more basic than China Eastern. My main concern when travelling is not what the airports or the planes are like, and considering the rock-bottom price I paid they could have strapped me to the wing for all I care.

I would like to mention an interesting social phenomenon I noticed at Luebeck though. It's the way people will spontaneously queue up with no real reason to do so. One moment everybody's sitting quietly in the terminal, then one person gets up to wait at the counter, followed by one more, and suddenly everybody's bustling to get in the line, and there has been no announcement or indication by staff that boarding is about to begin. And I admit I fell for it too. I just assumed there had been some announcement I missed, so I squeezed into the queue as well. But I guess it was a good thing because, Ryan Air's seats not being pre-allocated it's first come first served (not including the priority queue and those few people who booked seats), I got myself a window seat. Shame it was overcast most of the way and I slept for half the flight.

So then I arrived in London Stanstead with a 4 hour wait for my connection to Dublin. Here was a perfect opportunity to add another number to my Pub Challenge and generate an excuse to drink a pint at 10:30 in the morning.

It was an airport bar. What can I say. No atmosphere or personality, but they did serve Guiness and the girl at the bar was pretty cute, so I guess I can call that a victory. Besides, I completely forgot to take photo evidence of a nice pub I visited in Germany the night before I left for Ireland, so I guess it all evens out.

Interesting anecdote: you think I could find a pen anywhere to write that bloody note? I ended up scribbling it down quickly with a pen for sale at a bookshop while the checkout girl wasn't watching. At one point I thought for sure I would get a pen at one of those desks with slips to leave feedback about the airport, but even there there was no pen! Just the slips! Lucky for them too, because if there had been a pen I would have written a very angry note about how there were no pens to be found.

So then it was off to Ireland, and the first thing I did, obviously, was to get #3 out of the way. This pub was considerably better than #2, even though it too was an airport pub. The Irish really do have the best pubs in the world.

Yes, that is my own blood on the note. I decided it would be a nice idea to cut my finger open rummaging through my luggage, as you can see by the bandage on my middle finger.

Also annoying was the fact that the SIM card I bought in Germany claiming to be free roaming didn't work in Ireland, so I had to buy yet another one, bringing the total number of SIMs floating about my person up to 3, coincidently equal to the pub challenge number at that point. I really really hope that the two numbers don't keep matching each other, as I am since up to 6 pubs, as you will see in my next post.