Neither of us were very hungry, having breakfast at the Bloomfield was more about the experience of the thing, so we had a nice cleansing breakfast of toast, two bowls of fruit, and glasses of orange and cranberry juice. Today was our pre-planned “rest day” so it made sense to have a light breakfast of stuff that's, you know, actually good for us. After several days of greasy take-out for every meal we probably could do with a morning of just straight fruit and juice. I was told I could take my coffee with me to my room so I grabbed another cappuccino and we headed out, but not to our room. First we took a detour to the spa.
Our booking had included a 50 euro stipend each towards a spa treatment but we hadn’t known what we’d have time and energy for so we hadn’t booked anything, but as we were in no hurry to get anywhere for the day we decided to see if anything was available. There wasn’t anyone at the spa desk when we first arrived so we just looked at the services and saw there was a 55 euro back, neck, and shoulder massage which sounded delightful! But that sounded like something that might be booked up so we didn’t get our hopes up. When the attendant returned we said who we were and she gave a happy gasp and went “The Algieri’s! We’ve been looking for you!” Apparently the spa had been trying to reach us to figure out when we wanted our spa treatments and what treatments we wanted so they’d just slotted us each in for 5:00-5:30pm, but she said if we didn’t mind having treatments one at a time she could fit us in at noon and 12:30pm for the back, neck, and shoulder massage or facial. How totally perfect! It was almost 11am then so we got ourselves both booked for the massages and giddily went back to our room to get our luggage packed up in the car in time for checkout.
We had a little bit of time so we decided to sit outside at one of the tables and redo my hair and have our coffee. I’d made some hot chocolate back at the room with the kettle and the hot chocolate packets we’d brought and mixed that with the cappuccino and had, once again, made a mocha-thing! Perfect! So we had that and I redid my hair and in no time we were headed back to the spa for our massages! We were led into the spa area, which was dark and cool and immediately felt like the most relaxing place in the world. We were shown into the ladies changing room where we were told to get changed into the robes and slippers in the lockers and at our leisure head to the Relaxation Room to wait. The Relaxation Room was gorgeous, a dark place with lounge chairs and blankets and a sound system plaing water and nature noises of calming music. Very zen.
I decided to go first and get my massage and it was WONDERFUL! I haven’t had a massage in so long, not since an event at Stetson where I booked massage therapists for a destress fest. I did have to forewarn the masseuse, who was actually the woman working as the attendant at the front, that I am super ticklish and if she feels me tense up I’m not in paid, I’m just trying not to laugh. The massage was amazing, so calming and great, worked out some of the really bad knots I have in my back from years of working as a laundress. Not all of it, of course, but after days of flying and driving for hours it sure did wonders! After I was done I was led back to the Relaxation Room to switch off with Jessica.
I was left alone in the room then, basically catnapping until Jessica came back where we both laid down and relaxed for about and hour. We’d had a busy few days and it was so nice to have permission to just rest. We probably stayed longer than most people do, but no one seemed to be rushing us, and aside from two women who came in after us and left before us, we were just left to ourselves to enjoy the space. We did, eventually, decide it was time to go, mostly out of fear we were going to actually fall asleep if we stayed much longer, so we got changed and headed back to the spa reception desk. Now, in America we know to tip for spa services, but we weren’t sure if that was something we were expected to do in Ireland so we did what we’d been doing the past few days and just asked! She seemed a little on the spot about the question, probably not wanting to sound like she was sticking her hand out and demanding a tip from us, but she said it was normal to receive tips but not necessary. As long as it isn’t frowned upon, however, as it was when we were in France, we’re happy to tip, so we naturally did and then chatted for a bit with her about how Ireland had been so far and whether this was our first time here.
With that done we headed out to our car, blissed out and raving about how glad we were the spa service had worked out the way it had because what a perfect “activity” to do on our rest day! We continued that conversation inside the car where we had a lunch of some of our leftovers from the other day. Full, relaxed, and ready to go we began the hour drive to Dublin! It was a pretty easy drive, all things considered, but we did hit our first toll of the journey! We had a little trouble figuring out where we were supposed to go to pay in cash but we sorted it out and off we went, rather proud of ourselves for not making entire fools of ourselves doing this very normal activity.
We got a little turned around in Dublin on the way to our hotel, but we actually did quite good considering how messy it had gotten in Derry. We found parking right next to the hotel and the parking had an elevator right up to the hotel lobby! So up we went to check in, which was fairly simple. It’s a Conrad, so part of the Hilton brand which means we get the Team Member discount! We got checked in and a bellboy offered to take our luggage up for us, which felt very classy, but seeing as we only had the two suitcases we just took them up ourselves. In the room we checked out the crazy expensive in-room snacks, just to have a laugh about the prices, then got settled in for the official start of our “rest day” watching Murder, She Wrote and trying out the fancy in-room coffee machine!
As we sat in our room, watching our murder show, Jess felt the overwhelming urge to have some fun-food, as is customary while watching fun TV in a hotel room, so she found the location of the nearest Tesco and we headed out for soda and snacks! On the elevator an employee made some small talking asking about our plans and we told him we were just going to the Tesco to get snacks and he, very kindly, told us about some local pubs and clubs in the area if we were interested. I appreciate that he took us for young people who wanted to hit the town but no, our plans really were to just go to the Tesco and watch Murder, She Wrote! The Tesco was only a 10 minute walk or so and we were there in no time scouting the shelves for goodies and treats! We got a bottle of Fanta, some kind of fruit drink, some Jammie Dodgers, Crunchie Bars, Crunchie Bites, Aero Chips, and some blueberries. We had a quick chat at the self-checkout with an employee about the 15 cent deposit fee for the recycling which he had some strong opinions about, and then we were back at the hotel ready to relax and enjoy our evening!
After Murder, She Wrote finished we discovered Gone Girl playing on another channel and as it’s a favourite movie of ours we gladly settled in enjoy it playing in the background as Jess read her book, The Bad Seed, while I updated my blog. Around 11pm, about halfway through the film, we decided to hit the bar downstairs to have a cocktail before it closed at midnight and headed down for our final event of the day. The hotel bar was the kind you could get charged just for looking at, just dripping with luxury. We settled into a seat in the dark, ambient room and decided to order a Say What You See and a When Life Gives You Lemons for 16 euro each. Expensive, but they were loaded with alcohol so it felt worth it. We were there drinking and talking until I remembered to look at my phone and discovered it was 12:19pm and they were probably trying to get closed up. There was still another group there drinking and they hadn’t asked us to leave, but we’d finished our drinks so we settled our bill and headed upstairs.
Gone Girl had finished but when we flipped to another channel we discovered that one was also playing Gone Girl and it was at almost the exact spot we’d left at before! Talk about perfect! Buzzed and happy we watched our crazy girl movie and got ready for bed after a perfect, relaxing rest day. Well, rest day of sorts.
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