Ireland: Dublin

Back again. Marissa and I were last in the city March 17, 2012 rockin’ all of our Irish flair and excited for the festivities. The day of course was St Patrick’s Day, where EVERYONE is Irish. The streets were packed; the place was humming with excitement. We loved the parade and thought it was one of the best ones we had seen. But as you can imagine, the pubs were totally overcrowded – so much so that many of them we couldn’t even get inside the door. Luckily for us, we had some friends that were also in Dublin with us, so we hung out and had a few adult beverages in the streets with the thousands of other ‘Irish’.

Dublin this time around was much different in many ways. We were staying at a nice Airbnb centrally located, but in a more hipster, trendy part of town that we didn’t know existed before. It actually reminded us a lot of Brooklyn with cool and unique bars, shops and restaurants. We loved our Airbnb host who was born and raised in the area and was great to really pick his brain on places to go and see. He also went out of his way to ensure we had the best possible stay which was fantastic.

Feeling ambitious, we started our first full day in Dublin by going for a morning run.   It was the first time that we had ran in temperatures hovering around 40 degrees in quite some time. But it felt good and was a great way to check out the city as we ran through some of the main sights including St Stephen’s Green and Trinity College.   Afterwards, we bundled ourselves up and joined one of the free walking tours like we had done in many European cities. It is a great way to understand the local history and get the lay of the land. We really enjoyed the tour since we didn’t learn much of the history of the city in our previous trip.

Originally founded as a Viking settlement, Dublin became Ireland’s main city following the Norman invasion in the 12^th century. The city continued to gain prominence and was the second largest city in the British Empire (to London) during the 1700’s. We learned all about the independence of Ireland in 1922, which they are very proud of. Since that time Dublin has been the capital of Ireland and it’s largest city – where one third of the Irish population lives today.

After walking through the city, we decided we wanted to try the Jameson tour. It was interesting to learn how Jameson is made and how it has become a world famous Irish whiskey. We enjoyed the tour even though it was a bit touristy and in a place where they no longer manufacture Jameson (now the distillery is located in Middleton, Ireland near Cork). Marissa was even chosen as a volunteer taster (to compare Irish whiskey from American and Scotch whiskies!).

Later that evening we enjoyed a local Irish music/dance show. We decided against the dinner and show option and instead only attended the show portion due to our tight budget. When we arrived, we found an American tour group from San Diego had done the dinner portion and apparently really enjoyed themselves throughout the day as well. All of them were over the age of 50 and the majority of them had partied like it was 1969 earlier in the day. This became apparent when we sat down for the show and the first guy that sat down next to us was slurring his speech and had lost many motor skills. It was only 7 pm but these guys should have finished drinking hours before. After I switched spots with Marissa so she didn’t have to sit next to that guy, we had fun with the loaded group and really did enjoy the show. The band was comprised of 4 musicians including a woman who also performed Irish dancing. The show felt a little touristy but it was educational because they explained the instruments that they were playing which really helped to understand what traditional Irish music means.

The next day we wanted to check out the Chester Beatty Museum which is located on the Dublin Castle grounds. We heard about it during our walking tour the previous day. The museum houses an impressive collection of manuscripts, paintings, prints, drawings, rare books and some decorative arts from the Islamic, East Asian and Western Collections. The craziest part is that a single man, Chester Beatty, (a rich miner who loved collecting works of art) once owned the entire collection. Pretty cool that he donated this collection and now everyone can enjoy it. The best part is the museum is free!

After getting cultured we decided to explore the Temple Bar area. This district is the central hub of the city for food, drinks and entertainments and a popular destination for tourists. There are tons of pubs in the area, many of which feature live music. Marissa and I decided to go into a few to check them out since last time we were in the city we weren’t able to. We enjoyed some music but had an early evening and rested up for the last day.

On our last day in Dublin we visited a place that we had previously been to and loved – the Guinness Storehouse. There is a reason why it is the #1 most visited tourist attraction in Ireland. The place is shaped like a giant pint glass and has exhibits on 6 massive floors. You can learn all about the process to make the beer, how Guinness is marketed around the world, how to smell for specific aromas in the beer and the best… learn how to pour your very own perfect pint of Guinness which is an art all to it’s own. We loved it last time and it did not disappoint. The only downside is that we had to rush through it in order to catch our flight later that afternoon. We jogged 1.5 miles back to our Airbnb to quick grab our bags (yes – after drinking a pint of Guinness) then made our way to the center of the city to pick up our bus to the airport.

Unfortunately, we had a slight issue. There was a massive protest happening in the city center due the general public being outraged at the pending water tax being put into place. Imagine a country that gets so much rain paying a tax to get water! I don’t blame them for protesting. Protesting aside, it ended up being a pretty stressful situation. We couldn’t find our bus in the city we previously booked and ended up walking for miles (with our packs on) to find another bus to the airport. Luckily, we made the flight! But, it was anything but a relaxing day in transit for the ThumbsUp Travelers!