Dublin
On Saturday morning, we enjoyed the train ride to Dublin and taxied to the Buswells Hotel. We could not check in yet, but we were able to leave our bags. The Rick Steves tour didn't start until late Sunday afternoon so we had plenty of free time to explore Dublin.
Day 6: Dublin Pre Tour
We walked to the EPIC museum, an impressive multimedia experience that tells the story of the Irish diaspora. (We liked it so much we went back the next day!) I recommend it for anyone visiting Dublin, especially if you have Irish roots. Docked in the River Liffey in front of the museum is the Jennie Johnson, a replica of a “coffin ship” that took Irish passengers to America. I don’t know how my ancestors survived the trip; I’m not sure I would have. Nearby is a touching famine memorial. This whole visit got to me emotionally, knowing my ancestors lived through this horror while at the same time knowing I wouldn’t exist if they hadn’t gone through it and made the voyage to America.
Our next stop was the national art gallery, about two blocks from the hotel. The must-sees for me were their collection of Irish painter Jack Butler Yeats and the huge painting of The Marriage of Strongbow (about 10 feet X 20).
Click on the first photo to see each section in a larger slide show.
Day 1 of RS tour
After breakfast we walked to O’Connell street across the river. Saw the GPO with bullet holes. Saw the big spire that many call “the stiffy on the Liffey.” And James Joyce. Nearby we stumbled upon some great murals on the walls in an alley. Historical ones on one side with 1980s video games on the other.
After revisiting EPIC, we walked to the archaeological museum (across the street from our hotel) and saw the bog bodies, brooch of Tara, cross of cong and lots of antiquities. Very cool. Then we walked past our hotel to Bewleys Oriental Cafe on Grafton Street and admired the stained glass. So beautiful and impressive. I don’t say windows because these are hanging on the walls and lit from behind. Guests are welcome to enter and look at them for free, but we were so impressed that we stayed and had hot chocolate and pastries, surrounded by these million-dollar art works.
We met our tour group back at the hotel for orientation at 5. Lolly was our guide, with way more life experiences than we expected. (Rick Steves guides are always so interesting.) After dinner, she gave us an orientation walk around the area, including the statue of Molly Malone that had been in the news for months because of locals protesting tourists who rub the statue based on the rumor that doing so will give you good luck in the bedroom. Germs are more like it.
Day 2: Dublin
In the morning, we had a longer walk around Dublin, ending at Trinity College to view the Book of Kells. Since it’s one of the most popular tourist sites in Dublin, it was mobbed. They have large displays of pages from the book, but there’s only one actual page displayed each day. And today’s page was kind of blah, mostly blank with only a small illustration. A bit of a letdown. Then we entered the library, but it was so hard to breath in there that we had to leave within minutes. But in what look like shipping containers in a courtyard, they’re building an interactive display to entertain tourists while the library is being renovated, and they allowed us to go in. It was fantastic. There’s a video on the story of the Book of Kells that was way easier to understand and enjoy than the huge displays leading up to the book’s single page display. (I suspect that in the future this will replace the library tour and maybe even the build-up to the book page.)
After lunch we went to a famine exhibition at the Stephen Green mall that Lolly had recommended. No comparison to EPIC but this old fashioned style display focused strictly on the potato famine, with photos, text, and a short video projected on a wall. Once again, I had a hard time thinking about how my ancestors lived through this.
In the guidebook Rick Steves recommends the Musical Pub Crawl, which we had pre-booked for that night. We walked back down Grafton Street, past Molly Malone, into the Temple Bar area and then upstairs to a small pub. Two musicians with a full house. Great music and a tiny bit of a lesson on the music you’ll find in pubs in Ireland. More great craic.
