So the adventure to Manchester started off a little rough. Daliana was suppose to meet me at work and we were going to catch a ride to the airport with a coworker to save money. Instead she got lost and ended up at the airport in short term parking. After working it out and meeting up our plane was delayed an hour so we had a pint at the airport (surprisingly cheaper for a pint at the airport than downtown Dublin) We arrived in Manchester around 9 and made our way to the hostel. We stayed at Hatter's Hostel in the Northern Quarter. We went to a restaurant that was recommended by my friends at Crossfit Center Manchester. We had a couple of Danish meat/fish platters at Kro Picadilly.
After an eventful night for the rest of the hostel i.e. getting woken up at 2 and 4 am by rowdy hooligans- we started exploring downtown Manchester. Ashley caught a train up for Dartford and we made our way out to Old Trafford, The home to Manchester United. We were suppose to go to a game but it had been rescheduled due tot he Carling Cup final the following day. The tour of the grounds was really interesting and we got to go into the players locker rooms. We also got to see where the managers sit and listen to the history of the stadium. It reminded a lot of touring Fenway Park in Boston. It was really neat to visit a place I have grown up wanting to visit and having seen on TV since I was little.After the tour we went to the "Curry Mile" for a delicious lunch. The curry mile is a street in Manchester filled with Indian/Thai/SEA resteraunts. We luckily chose a great place. The waiter was really friendly and even gave us a free dish to try. We tried chicken tikka, korma and sambra- and Lamb khalida. We then moved to the main shopping district and one of the biggest malls in europe. England was playing Ireland in the 6 Nations rugby tournament so we watched it at an english pub. A real tense game that came down to the wire but Ireland pulled up the upset. Sam's Chophouse and Thomas Chophouse were two cool pubs that we hit. Saturday night was less eventful but the 7:30am wakeup call for the flight was still brutal. Arriving at the airport we couldn't find the passport check for ryanair and made it all the way through security to the gate. I was cleared to board but Daliana tried to play illegal alien and got us taken out of line and reprimanded. After giving us hand written boarding passes we were allowed to board. An uneventful flight finished the trip.
My mentor from Abbott was visiting for a global Conference. I met him and several other Abbott people in Temple bar for dinner. It was a nice close to the weekend.
Today I visited the Cootehill Abbott Nutrition Manufacturing plant. I got to meet all the other Irish PDPs at their version of PDP week. The infant formula plant processes 500,000L of skim milk per day and 98 million lbs of powder per year. It was a good trip and I'm looking forward to having my parents come up this weekend.
