Day 146: Exploring Dublin

We've been here for a day and a half, but it's finally time to get out and explore Dublin! Last night we'd gone through and figured out what we wanted to see, so all we needed to do was follow the plan - easy.

Left the house around 10:15 and caught a bus into the city (without Schnitzel for a change). Our first stop was a free walking tour of the central city, run by a company we've used a couple of times before. Although the tour itself is "free", you're expected to tip the guide as payment which is actually good - it gives the guide an incentive to be as good as possible. Our guide was an older Irish guy named John, very chatty and friendly and quite knowledgeable about the city and its history.

Over the next 3 hours he showed us around the castle (of which there's basically nothing left), Christchurch Cathedral, an important theatre, the place where U2's career started, the Rory Gallagher memorial, and of course Trinity College. Finishing up here was quite handy, since that was our next stop!

After a quick coffee break we headed in to see the Book of Kells housed in the library here. These are hand-written copies of the Four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John), lavishly decorated and illustrated with rich colours and beautiful script, dating from the 8th century. Yes, books that have survived in fantastic condition for 1200 years - difficult to believe! Apparently they were buried in a vault for hundreds of years to hide them from Viking pillagers, and were only recovered in the 17th century. Very impressive though!

We also headed upstairs to check out the Long Room in the library, which is a beautiful tall and long building, rich mahogany wood, with shelves upon shelves of books. Lining the entire room are busts of famous people (some writers and philosophers like Shakespeare, Swift and Plato, others lesser known like Doctor Baldwin). Took some photos and then headed out.

Final stop on our day out was of course the Guinness Storehouse in the west of the city. We walked over because it didn't look that far, but was actually about 30 minutes walk! Oh well. The tour was great, somewhere between a museum, a Disneyland queue and a trade show. Although it's an interesting history, working in marketing and advertising for 17 years gave me a slightly different takeaway to most people I guess. It's basically what you'd call "experiential marketing", and it's sort of amusing to think you've just paid 20 euros each to experience a multi-hour Guinness commercial.

And it's not like Guinness is a small family-owned company either - they're fully owned by Diageo which is the world's largest spirits company (they also own Smirnoff, Tanqueray, Pimms, Johnnie Walker, Baileys and Kilkenny among many many others). Oh well. It was still fun, we enjoyed pulling our own pint and then drinking it on the rooftop bar with a great view of the city.

Got a cab back into the main area of town (Temple Bar), where we hit up Bad Bob's for an early dinner (it was now around 6pm). Had some very tasty burgers and a pint of beer, then decided to head for home on the bus. Schnitzel very excited to see us, as he'd been on his own for quite a while and he's not as used to that these days. A bit more planning and videoing tonight before an early night ahead of a long travel day tomorrow!Read more