A Weekend in Dublin!

This weekend my friend Kirby and I caught a plane over to Dublin to be tourists for the weekend!

We were welcomed by a beautiful sunset and a lovely evening for exploring the area. We stayed in the Temple Bar area, home to the appropriately named and well-known Temple Bar. It's the area with the most pubs per block that I saw. This was really nice because we really wanted pub food, so we had lots of options!

After dropping our backpacks off at the Airbnb place, we went to the Porterhouse, which our host recommended. Kirby and I both had veggie burgers. We were pleasantly surprised to get some live music while we ate, which was really nice. The band that was playing was composed of a guitarist, a drummer, and a piper playing the uilleann pipes.

After dinner, we walked around to get a feel for the area. We stumbled across St. Patrick's Cathedral.

We also realised that Dublin does Christmas even earlier than Edinburgh. To any Americans who have ever complained that the Christmas season starts too early, I no longer have any sympathy. At least in the US Thanksgiving sort of limits when Christmas can start, but in the UK Christmas starts mid-November.

We happened to be there on the first day of Dublin's Christmas market, so we walked through it and treated ourselves to a Nutella crepe.

nollaig shona duit means happy Christmas

We turned in early because we knew Saturday was going to be a long day. We got up, grabbed breakfast, and headed to the Dublin Writers Museum. On the way, we were greeted by scenic views of the Liffey River.

We got to the museum a few minutes before it opened, so we went across the street to the Garden of Remembrance. It honours all the people who died for Irish independence. 

Then we headed into the museum. I would highly recommend it, but only if you actually like literature and/or have read some of the authors featured prominently in the museum, such as Oscar Wilde, James Joyce, W.B. Yeats, Bram Stoker, and Jonathan Swift. I didn't really know that much about a lot of the authors and poets, but I was interested, which is key.

The museum is in an 18th-century house that is gorgeous on its own. It has all sorts of first editions, authors' typewriters, and things like James Joyce's piano. 

After the museum, we headed to Trinity College, where a lot of the authors we learned about we to school. We wanted to see the library in particular, but it turns out it costs 10 euros and there was a massive queue, so we moved on. It was a bit of a bummer, but it's the only thing we really didn't get to do on the trip.

Statue of James Joyce

Statue of Molly Malone

One of the things we also wanted to walk by was the house where Oscar Wilde was born.

On the way to the next museum we wanted to see, we popped into the National Library, which was amazing. We didn't stay long, but I'm so glad we went in! 

After the library, we went to the National Archaeology museum. Kirby is taking archaeology and we are both taking anthropology, so it was a really interesting museum for us. Most of the museum went through different periods in Irish history, such as the Bronze Age and the history of Vikings, but I was particularly interested in the Ancient Egypt exhibit. Just like in Glasgow, I was fascinated by the hieroglyphics.

Also, I would just like to note that the building that housed the museum was so pretty. This is a picture of the ceiling in the atrium as you walk in, but the whole building has the most beautiful decorations inside and out.

After this museum, we got lunch at a place called Mama's Revenge, where we got burritos. They were some seriously good ones, too. Not only were there rice, beans, salsa, etc., but there were sweet potatoes, peppers, and roasted aubergines. It was not your average burrito!

After lunch, we went to the Art Museum, wherein we found an art exhibit that had to do with Irish Writers. We were beginning to see a pattern. Do you think Dublin is proud of its authors? The exhibit houses amazing paintings that were chosen by Irish writers as inspiring to them. Some of the paintings are by Irish artists, but some of them are by artists like Monet!

This painting reminds me of Edinburgh, because the Castle looks just like that when you catch a glimpse of it from down an alley.

In another exhibit, there were paintings from various European Artists from every time period from the Renaissance to the present, including a Machiavelli!

I also quite liked this painting of Dublin.

Next we headed for a different area of town. We ducked into Dublin Castle, which I was happy to find out was free to see the main courtyard and the chapel, which was all we really had time to see anyway.

The architecture inside the church and the organ were just astounding!

The last thing we did before dinner was go to the Guinness Storehouse, where we learned about how they make Guinness everything else you could ever want to know about beer. I actually found the section about how they make barrels to be exceptionally interesting. I'm so glad we went because I have a much greater respect and understanding for beer, even though I still don't like it.

After you go through the museum, you get to go to the bar on the 7th floor. We happen to be up there just as the sun was going down and got to watch another amazing sunset over Dublin.

Also, as part of the ticket price, you get a pint of Guinness. I tried it and was surprised that it was not that bad, but I don't think I'll be ordering it at the pub any time soon.

We walked back to where we were staying, took a little breather, and then headed out to find some more pub food. We struggled to find somewhere with vegetarian options, but eventually decided on the Oliver St. John Gogarty Pub, which is of course named after an Irish poet. I didn't get any traditional Irish food, but we were treated once again to some lovely live Irish music. We stayed for a really long time because we were really enjoying the music. We actually both ordered tea so we could justify taking up the table for another hour.

After dinner, we wandered around for an hour or two. I didn't realize it was so late, because our phones both died, and then we realized it was midnight, so we headed back, because we had to get up early this morning to go home.

When we got ready, packed all our stuff up, and headed to find breakfast, we were treated once again by the weather. We watched the sun rise over a completely quiet Dublin. Saturday night is probably the busiest time to be out in Dublin, especially the Temple Bar area, and Sunday morning is probably the emptiest you can ever see Dublin. I would highly recommend getting up early to walk around. It was so peaceful!

The alleys that had been full the night before were empty. It was quite bizarre.

Right before we got the bus to the airport, we treated ourselves to the best breakfast I have had in a long time. We went to a place called Taste Food Company. I got tea, porridge, and poached eggs on rye and it was so good.

One thing Kirby and I noticed was that everyone is so nice. We got help from people who overheard us trying to figure out where we were going and a woman at the Christmas market just started chatting with us. We just kept saying over and over how nice people were to us.

Next time I'm in Dublin I want to see the Trinity Library, where they keep the Book of Kells; these two book shops we heard about that were south of Trinity College; and Kilmainham Gaol, which Nikki recommended to me, but we didn't have enough time for.

Overall, we had such an amazing time in Dublin. Saturday turned out to be the perfect day. It didn't rain on us once while we were out and we got to see everything we wanted to see. I can't wait to see more of Ireland!