College Station, Texas Ballinasloe, Ireland

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October 24 – Wednesday - Morning – College Station, Texas - I am at Easterwood with my baggage checked in. I got here 2 1/2 hours early as requested by the airlines but "security" doesn't open for another hour. No big deal. I'd rather be an hour early than a minute late. Since most airports have free wifi and plugs it gives me a good slice of usable stress free time to check out a few things. The coffee in the snack bar here is darn good as well.

My plane shows to be on time so I should be in the air by Noon.

1:15 PM Dallas/Ft Worth– I’m at the airport in Dallas-Ft Worth waiting on the next leg of my trip which is to Chicago, to board. The flight over was a bit rough and it seems that the plane made some unusual maneuvers on the way here. It is getting to be my objective opinion that the flights out of and to Easterwood airport are used as “training flights”. Either that or they are piloted by former fighter jet pilots….You know what Sport…the wars over….calm down a bit ……..and they don’t charge you by the yard for the runway you use either.

I went to a BBQ place here in the airport between flights. It served some very mediocre food. I sure hope no one takes their opinion of Texas BBQ from eating there.

They are boarding now so I guess I will put away my laptop and get ready. There is no free internet access I could connect to here so I will send this out later.

5:35 PM – Chicago – I’m at the airport in Chicago. Coming in when I looked out the window I was surprised to see that the leaves are changing to Autumn colors here. It’s still like summer in South Central Texas.

So that’s 2 legs down and one to go on this crossing. It is kind of amazing when you think of it that the Atlantic can be crossed so easily and quickly (at least if you have money……even if someone managed to cross the ocean without money the other country would probably just send them back…..they don’t want any broke people there either.

It’s something when you think of it that just a generation ago when people said goodbye to each other when someone crossed the Atlantic they knew that it was probably the last time they would see each other. I’m sure my mother and her parents realized that back in 1946 when she came to America. And it turned out to be the case sadly.

So put in perspective it is sort of Amazing that I can hop back and forth from America to Europe with relative ease. It’s no more trouble that a trip to Ft Worth actually. Albeit a tad more expensive.

8:00 PM – Chicago - We loaded up in the plane and took off on schedule. I noticed that we take off out over Lake Michigan. I guess that’s good as if the plane goes down it will go into the lake instead of on top of someone’s house. We head out over the lake and “the glove” of Michigan and then we are on our way.

It is 3,768 miles (6063km ) from Chicago to Dublin. The flight takes about 7 hours. Because of the time difference we will arrive in Dublin at 0800AM local time which is 2AM central time. Ireland is 6 hours ahead of US Central time.

I got lucky on this flight. It had plenty of empty seats and as soon as I saw the stewardess’s closing the overhead bins (which means everyone is on board) I moved from my seat to an empty row. So now later on I can pull up the armrest and lay across the 3 seats. I’ve scarfed up 5 pillows as well. : )



Thursday October 25 – Dublin and Ballinasloe – I arrived safely at Dublin Airport at 8:40AM. I was 40 minutes late because the Gulf Stream wasn’t cooperating. I went through the usual cursory immigration stop where he took my filled out form and asked how long I would be in Ireland and stamped my passport. Then got my bag off the turnstile and I walked through the green line (nothing to declare) and to the arrivals area.

I had wanted to weigh my bag to see how much it weighed so I could better judge how much I could add when I flew on British Airways on Saturday. I went down to the check in area and there were now two 1€ scales to check the weight of your bag where there had previously been a free scale. It is nice to be able to check the weight of my check in luggage so I could take some stuff out and put it in my carry on bag if I needed so as to keep the weight of the check in bag below the weight limit.

After checking the weight of my bag I walked over the enclosed walkway and down the elevator to the Bus stops. If I were going into Dublin the stop is right by the elevators/escalators but as I was taking the X20 Galway bus and getting off at Ballinasloe I had to walk over about 100 yards to the Bus Eireann bus stops. I bought a ticket to Ballinasloe with “return” because it is much cheaper for a round trip instead of purchasing each time as I get on. The Ballinasloe Return ticket was €17. The return portion is good for 30 days.

I rode the bus to Ballinasloe and got off at Dunloe Street and my cousin Brian met me. We walked over to the house and as it was a bit cold made a quick walk of it. After visiting a bit and eating and having some tea I went to bed and took a nap till about 7PM and got up to visit a bit more and get on the Internet. My first task is to get my sleep cycle turned around.

Tomorrow if the weather permits I will walk around Ballinasloe a bit and take some pictures. The trees here are displaying their fall colors and some are even losing their leaves already.

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