The start of Phase Two of our Great Adventure begins on Monday, August 1. We had ordered a Taxi from the Free Now app (similar to Uber, but for taxis) and our driver, Patrick and his van arrived spot on at exactly 7:15 AM as ordered. We loaded our huge pile of luggage into the vehicle and headed for the Dublin airport. Before we had left the BnB, Howie and Lee received a notice from United Airlines that their flight this morning was cancelled. However until arrival at the airport, there was nothing else to do but get there and see what lay ahead. Deb had been unable to contact Aer Lingus using the app so we could not check on that flight to London. Not an auspicious start to a long day of traveling. The high point was that we arrived at the airport well before 8:00 in order to start our respective battles.
After a long line wait at Aer Lingus, the Coverts were directed to another line, but this was most helpful. Evidently the original flight booked last March had been reshuffled and we had not received notice of the change. We were rebooked on the appropriate flight and scheduled for take-off at 11:15. All good news. However the Needelman's news was not so good. There were no flights back to the US for two days! United booked them on this next flight, provided them with a hotel room for the two nights, and food vouchers.Needless to say, the food vouchers were not for first class meals, rather closer to subsistence, but they weren’t going to starve, and they were able to upgrade a meal or two after determining the lay of the land.
Deb & Mark walked to their gate and watched with chagrin as the gate changed before their eyes. Luckily it was only two gates away. It seems as if every flight out of Dublin was running late. Originally scheduled for an 11:15 departure, the aircraft finally pulled away from the gate after 1:00. The one hour flight was smooth and uneventful. We landed at Heathrow and proceeded to baggage claim. It was a full 45 minutes before our bags came off the conveyor belt - all three bags made it with nary a hitch. We weren’t even charged for the extra bag. It seems that coming from Dublin, there was no need to flow through Passport/Immigration so we sauntered in through the “Nothing to Declare” gate and headed to the car rental station. We were directed to queue up at bus station 7-8 for the shuttles to the National Car rental lot.
Once there, we alighted, handed over our driver’s license to Sandy,the check-in man, and were assigned a 4-door red Kia Niro, an automatic, and almost identical in size to our Subaru Crosstrek at home. This vehicle is 5 years newer than our Subaru and has all the latest technology such as lane detection - a real help/hinderance when it’s beeper alerts to a transgression on the part of the driver.
We negotiated our way out of the London metropolitan area and headed to The North along the M-1 and eventually the A-1. Both routes are limited access motorways akin to our Interstate system and very well marked. Our first goal was the market town of Richmond in North Yorkshire, the easternmost point of the Yorkshire Dales National Park. Once there, we found our way along the A6108 to the village of Marske and then onto the B6270 directly into our destination village of Gunnerside. The entire area is known as Swaledale. The word Dale means valley and the road follows the River Swale, hence Swaledale. It even lends its name to a breed of sheep.
We arrived at our new temporary home of Burnside Cottage by 8:30, still enough daylight to find our way. The cottage was exactly as advertised, it was inviting and they had left some lights on. We loaded our luggage in, made a dinner snack of some wine, cheese and crackers which we had purchased at a rest stop earlier in the afternoon, and generally sat back, amazed at our day’s journey. 13 plus hours of taxi, airplane, bus, and a 5 1/2 hour drive along the English motorways and back roads to arrive at this small stone cottage originally constructed in 1804.
