Day 1
Day 1 - 6 February 2009
Dublin or Bust!
Our journey to Dublin was really exciting and also a bit complicated. Vytas, the accommodation manager left one day earlier to arrange everything for us. He had some challenges with the flight, due to the unusual weather. After all he managed to get a plane to Dublin. Our group had to leave the coordinator, Dainora at home, as she got ill right before our departure. We truly hope she will recover soon and joins us later on. Late-night Dublin welcomed us with thousands of lights and cold wind.
After going through the passport control and the luggage collection hall, we met the Hungarian group who were waiting for us with excitement. We gathered together and travelled to Dublin International Youth Hostel by taxi. It was nice to see such a lively city, night clubs and bars. The staff at the hostel reception made us feel welcomed although it was 1.30 a.m. Later on, we all went to our rooms, settled down and exchanged few words before tiredness took us to the beds. My last thought before falling asleep was “what an exciting adventure is waiting for us!”
Eglė Dragūnaitė (Lithuanian group)
Where are you?
Dublin here we come!
This should become a very nice (and short) trip as it has been well organised. The German group of 18 people met on the train to Duesseldorf airport on Friday afternoon. At the same time 5 Lithuanian students, 5 Hungarian participants and a group of 4 students from Britain are getting ready to fly. Only 7 hours later they all had to arrive in Dublin. But this trip became a bit different…
Everyone was really excited and were looking forward to meeting the other groups in Ireland. However, because of some different reasons the Germans flight has been cancelled, the Lithuanians had to travel without their coordinator and nearly all flights were delayed so it seemed to be impossible to catch the train to Westport on the next day.
Finally the lucky Hungarians and Lithuanians met in the middle of the night at Dublin airport and got in touch with each other. The British joined the others at the hostel in the early morning.
The Germans had another try to get to Dublin on Saturday morning. They met again on the train to the airport and after the arrival they were happy to hear that this flight was not cancelled. The plane was late but they got their luggage very quickly and met some nice taxi drivers who managed to get them to the train station right in time, so finally all participants met for the first time.
So it has been the fantastic work of our travel manager who really tried everything to get the group to Dublin (luckily she travelled with the German group). Thanks to her, the German group finally managed to reach the train to Westport, and all the participants are able to reach Achill together.
Anne Gruender (German group)
