Overseas Travel and Receiving Texts

Online security being what it is these days, we use 2FA or Two Factor Authentication whenever possible while accessing accounts online.  If you're not doing this, you're at risk.

I elected to not pay Verizon $10/day to be able to use our Verizon ESIMs while in Europe (this feature is called Travel Pass).  Total cost would have been roughly $750 for our two phones, a bit high)

I went with a third party ESIM from Holafly (which sucks at activation processes, not recommended).  Cost <$3/day per phone; came to roughly $100/phone.

So, we had Internet access but Verizon ESIM had to be off.  Important caveat: the third party ESIM only provided internet access, no phone call capabilities.

This meant that when an online resource, such as our bank/credit card company wanted to verify it was me trying to login, it sent a text with authentication code to my Verizon mobile number as I'd previously set up.

Of course, my Verizon ESIM being turned off (and no Travel Pass), no texts so no authentication code.

Workarounds:

Best option:  Set up email as a 2FA authentication code option.  Not all companies offer this at this time however.

If email option not available, here's what worked for me and my Verizon account.  YMMV:

1.  While connected to good Wi-Fi Internet, go to your phone's SIM Manager and turn on the Verizon ESIM.  Leave your third party ESIM turned on.  

Note: enable a VPN if possible since you're accessing account credentials on a public Wi-Fi access point!

2.  Immediately, turn on Airplane Mode while ensuring Wi-Fi is still enabled!  (On my Android phone, SIM Manager is disabled when in Airplane mode)

3.  Queued up texts (sent to me while Verizon ESIM was off) would then start arriving, to include the 2FA text I needed in the moment.  Got the code, authenticated and was into my account.

4.  Once you're done, remember to disable airplane mode and immediately turn off the Verizon ESIM!

I also called Verizon support, while on Wi-Fi Internet and using my Google Voice number and had them remove Travel Pass from all mobile lines to prevent accidental activation of this feature and ensuing costs.

I believe the above workaround required Wi-Fi calling turned on.

You can receive texts but not send via Verizon ESIM.  You'll get a "trying to connect" error.

Texting while overseas was via apps such as Signal or Whatsapp.  It does require both parties to use the same app however.

You cannot make calls via Verizon ESIM when not using Travel Pass.  That's where Google Voice came in but it only works with US numbers!  If I ever travel overseas again, will have to do more research on this).

Almost bought another ESIM for voice calls in Spain but got by without; once Booking.com resolved internal issues which made bookings impossible when using our US credit cards.

Related Note/Caveat:

2FA via SMS texts is no longer as secure as it used to be.  Local authenticator apps are better but commercial entities aren't moving fast enough to implement this option 

Back Home

 Sunday, May 25

A long travel day.

After another full Irish breakfast, we got a taxi to the Dublin airport.  Traffic was very light into the metro area. 

Although the airport was crowded, it wasn't as bad as I have seen other airports.  Aer Lingus, the airline we were taking, moved us cattle smoothly through the check-in / bag drop off process.

Once through security, we cooled our heels until 12:45 p.m. when we could then access the US pre-clearance area.  

One pint of Guinness consumed at this point for hydration purposes.

Once we were through this area we were cleared through US customs while still in Ireland!  Nice.

Some more waiting near gate 403 until they started boarding our flight around 2:40 p.m. 

Another pint of Guinness was consumed at this point, again for hydration purposes. 

Kudos to Aer Lingus on the way they herded us cattle through this process and onto the plane, very smooth.  I'm sure it helped that the flight was not fully sold out but still, very smooth.  

I kind of like the way European airports control passenger/cattle flow through the various checkpoints.  Not being told what gate you're departing from till about 2 hrs beforehand was weird at first but I think it works better.  It cuts down on gate lice crowding departure gates!

We pushed off the gate 2 minutes early and we left Ireland under rainy overcast skies.

Aer Lingus fed us a meal and a snack during the 9 hour flight.  We also had snacks with us as we watched downloaded and in-flight movies to kill time while trapped in a metal cylinder.

We got to Denver a few minutes early, having experienced turbulence as we approached the airport.  A big storm had apparently moved through the area an hour before.

This storm delayed flights and operations at DIA.  We had to sit on the parking apron of Concourse A for over an hour before our gate became available!

Finally un-assed the plane and walked to baggage claim, happy to be back in US soil in spite of weather delays.

Some more delay until we figured out our luggage was sent to different carousel, thanks DIA, for nothing.

Our ride from the airport, a dear friend of Martha, picked us up under heavy rains.  

So, we got home in 3 hrs vs the usual 1 hour, oh well.  This is the last overseas traveling we'll be doing for a long while I believe.

Thanks for following along.

The Dublin Layover: Malahide Sights

Friday, May 23

We stayed in town today, the idea being to rest our feet from the last couple of days.

It was only a 16,800 steps/6.92 miles day.  So much for resting!

Anyways, we wandered over to the Malahide Castle grounds and park.  Quite a large area for folks to enjoy grassy fields, cricket pitches, and just simply open spaces.

Traffic was a heavy, with long backups.

There are several wood carvings along the path to the castle:

Malahide Abbey

Martha took the castle tour and I returned to the hotel after a walk along parts of Malahide Beach.

Friday lunch:

Saturday, May 24

Martha, still having some energy, went into Dublin once again.  She took the Rick Steves Walking Tour I believe.  She got in 20,000 steps/8.3 miles!  

I'm peopled out and my feet hurt so I stayed back at the hotel.  I only did 3500 steps.

We had a late lunch around 2:30 p.m. at Gibney's Pub.  Burgers and Fries.

We rested the rest of the day away, preparing for the long flight back to Denver tomorrow.

Here's the sunset Ireland gave us on our last day of our Dublin Layover.

Per Martha's Fitbit, we walked close to 250 miles in the 52 days we spent traveling.  This includes the walking we did aboard the cruise ship.

We drove 4352 kilometers or 2611 miles with the rental car.

We're both quite ready to go home.

The Dublin Layover: Guiness Storehouse Tour and the National Museum of Ireland

Thursday, May 22

Only, 17,100 steps (7.14 miles) today.  Our feet are mad at us.

We rode the tram into Dublin again, then transferred by bus to the stop nearest the Guinness Storehouse.

Some frustration caused by confusing instructions from Google maps had to be resolved.  It also didn't help that Holafly hot spot failed Martha.   Holafly sucks.

Anyways, we made it to the entrance and found that reservations or not, you get to go in.  We had reservations for Noon but got in at 11.

Turns out they let in groups of about 50+ every 15 minutes or so.  The venue is oversold leading to very crowded conditions with brief intervals when areas are not too badly crowded.

Even Martha was displeased.  Still, while some of the exhibits were "meh", others were good.  The architectural bits were nice and the Guinness pints on the 7th floor hit the spot.

Martha and I recommend that if you do this tour, immediately race upstairs to get your free pint.  Then, pint in hand, slowly make your way down to view the exhibits.  It's what we should have done!

Views from 7th floor bar area.  Too bad Dublin's skyline isn't much.

The center of the building is open so you look up/down into neighboring floors in an Escher-like manner:

My question is, why not show the whole kangaroo?

tasting room

After the tour, and not wanting to do the public transport commute the next day, we opted to do the National Museum of Ireland today instead of tomorrow.

First, we had lunch nearby then walked to the museum, which is located in former military barracks.

It had two sections: Decorative Arts and Irish History via military history.

Some of the things that caught my jaded eye:

Pikeman 

In case you've ever wondered, the British equivalent to the US Congressional Medal of Honor is the Victoria Cross:

It's the all red cloth medal

Part of the Easter Rising exhibits: a way to carry a gun, concealed.

Bullet Proof Vest

We decided to forego the Decorative Arts portion of the museum.

Instead we checked out the Asgard exhibit of a famous gun runner yacht.

Info on this historic vessel here:  LINK

It was around 3:20 p.m. at this point so we went to try and beat rush hour (4-7 p.m.).

The more modern LUAS tram was packed already but we only needed to ride it a short while to the DART station on Tara Street.

We caught the DART tram to Malahide with 6 minutes to spare thanks to a kind local who saw we were confused once again by google maps while at the Connolly Station.

We managed to snag seats in the almost full tram car and stayed seated the whole 30 minutes or so back to Malahide.

We picked up some snacks on our way back to the hotel and felt our feet ached, ending the day just resting them.