Dublin and the Land of Leprechauns

Hello! Last week I was fortunate enough to have some friends visiting the UK from the States. Ryan and Brianne arrived in Dublin last Thursday, and flew there to spend the weekend with them. After Dublin, they took a few days to make their way to London, where we spent some more time together. This post is about our adventures in Ireland!

To see my pics of this post, click the following link: http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/bbergey/Dublin#

Ryan and Brianne have also posted a much more extensive blog with many many more pics on their website. If you feel like reading a novel, go here: http://www.ryanandbrianne.com/. In all seriousness, I've probably lost my "newbie" touch, so it's pretty interesting to hear their take on everything.

The trip started on Thursday when I left work a little early and took a shuttle up to Stansted airport. The flight to Dublin was about an hour long. I was able to book my flight on a low-budget airline for £0 plus taxes. So my roundtrip ticket was about £20! I arrived in Dublin and took a bus downtown and arrived at the hotel where Ryan and Brianne had already checked in. They had left a key for me at reception and I went to the room and watched some TV until they arrived. It was the first time I had seen the Simpsons in about 4 months and it was great! I also started eating some of the snacks they brought me from the States. THANK YOU! After catching up for a bit, we walked across the street to an Irish pub named Kingfisher’s. The food was really good and Ryan's fish n' chips looked amazing! Oddly enough, they only had Heineken on tap, but it was still very tasty. Ryan had one pub that we had to visit before we left Dublin, so we decided to check it out the first night. It was called Messrs Maguire and it was a really cool building. Lots of staircases and small random rooms everywhere. I'll let you read Ryan's description on his blog for a better description. After a few rounds there, we hit up another local pub called Grand Central. This place was much less crowded and was a really cool historical building complete with a huge dome in the ceiling. We had another round or two there before heading back to the hotel bar for our last drink of the night. By the time we got back to the room around 2am, we were excited that we only had another hour to wait until Obama's DNC speech was on. Unfortunately we all fell asleep mins before it started.

Our hotel was centrally located in Dublin, which is a smaller city than what I expected. The downtown/central area of Dublin is definitely all walkable, although it was still a lot of walking. The River Liffey runs through the middle of the city, splitting it in half North/South. There are many scenic bridges that cross the water and lots of restaurants and pubs line its banks. On Friday morning, Ryan and Brianne were clearly still adjusting to UK time, so even after sleeping in until after 8am, I decided to explore the area a bit. I drank some water, grabbed my camera and walked around the area surrounding the hotel. The area was filled with malls and shops. There was even an old street market right next door with sketchy old ladies selling cheap produce. I managed to buy a bunch of grapes, 8 bananas and a handful of apples for €1.50. We later found the grapes were quite fuzzy.

Friday was filled with Dublin sightseeing. After the others woke up and we were all ready (around noon) we went to a great crepe cafe that Brianne had picked out. They had a wide variety of both savory and sweet crepes, as well as waffles and sandwiches. From there we walked through town, passing Dublin Castle and a number of other historical and neat buildings, and ended up at Phoenix Park - the largest park in Europe! The park was filled with beautiful gardens and very nice grass, although we only saw a small portion of the entire park. We spent most of our time at a giant monument and even managed to climb up to it's lowest ledge. One thing you won't read about in B and R's blog is the process of getting Brianne off of the ledge. And I made sure there is plenty of documentation!

After leaving Phoenix Park, we headed to the highlight of Dublin, the Guinness Storehouse! All Guinness is made in Dublin and the entire campus is really large. Expecting something similar to the Coors tour, I was surprised to see that it was a self-tour. So after you enter, you follow the route up a number of floors learning about different parts of the Guinness business. At the top, there are 3 bars where you can select where you'd like to enjoy your free pint. Ryan and I decided to get ours from the bar where you actually get to pour the pint yourself! It's a fairly complicated procedure and takes hours of study and dedication. In the end, we received our own certificates. The very top floor, called the Gravity Bar, is a circular room surrounded by windows with excellent views of the city.

Once finished, we continued walking around Dublin and passed through the Temple Bar area. This is the area of town filled with all of the fancy pubs, restaurants and bars and is extremely popular with tourists. It did look really nice, but it was also expensive and we never actually ate or drink in Temple Bar. After some rest in the hotel, we did find an excellent (and pretty fancy) Thai restaurant where I had some amazing Pad Thai. We ended the night with a few drinks at a pub called O'Neill's and a final drink in the hotel bar. The final drink was purchased for us by a member of a stag party (bachelor party). The stag himself was even dressed in a banana costume. Please don't ask me to elaborate.

On Saturday we decided to venture from the city a bit and take public transportation (the DART) north to the coastal towns of Malahide and Howthe. Malahide is the furthest north the DART travels and has a quaint bay, beaches and a castle. After exploring the main village and the coastline a bit, we made our way to the Malahide Castle. For a full description of our journey there, you will need to read B and R's blog. To sum it up, it involves alligators, golfers, a thick forest, grapes, a few "ok, you were right's," and what seemed like 8 and a half days. But in the end we made it! From Malahide, we took the DART down to the smaller coastal village of Howthe. I really liked Howthe. It has a rugged coastline and a jetty that formed a small bay filled with sailboats of all sizes. At the end of the jetty sat a small lighthouse with great views of the coast, the village and a nearby island. Howthe also had an amazing fish n' chips shop that we read about. I managed to inhale mine and then enjoyed some chips that B and R weren't able to finish. Howthe also has amazing ice cream that I also enjoyed. After arriving back in Dublin, we took another rest in the hotel and I then decided to ask a hotel staff for a dinner recommendation. One thing we learned in Dublin is that it's hard to find food late at night, and it was already after 8pm. She pointed us to an area on the map and we took off, excited to get some good local grub. The area on the map ended up being the financial district of Dublin and it was completely deserted with no sign of anything edible in sight. 2 hours later we finally came across an Italian restaurant near Trinity College that was still serving food. Lucky us! We finished the night at Grand Central, where Brianne even followed through on her "threat" to have a shot!

Our final day in Dublin was primarily spent in the Trinity College area. It started on Graffton street, which is a long pedestrian mall filled with shops and restaurants. We had "breakfast" (lunch) at a coffee shop/cafe and we had a great table at the window where we could people watch and observe the street performers. We also walked around St. Stephens Park which was full of statues, fountains and avian specimens. After Ryan and Brianne left to catch their flight, I still had a few hours on my own before my flight left. I decided to check out the Trinity College campus. It was very neat as it is in the middle of the city and completely surrounded by a wall. So once you enter the campus it is very peaceful and calm. I continued to walk around the area surrounding the school and then decided to go for a run through the city before heading to the airport. It was basically an attempt to sweat out all of the food and alcohol that was in my system, and it felt good to get out and see a local neighborhood up close.

Hours later at the airport, I was completely shocked when I felt a tap on my shoulder and saw Ryan! Long story short, they couldn't find their bus stop to the airport, got there late, missed their flight, and were now waiting for the next flight out which was still a couple hours away. So I joined them in an airport cafe for a while and ended up leaving Dublin before them!