Dublin

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Friday 31st July

Today is our free day in Dublin and I have passed on the optional tour to Glendaloch in favour of spending the day in Dublin seeing the sights...

First stop of the day is Trinity College to see the Book of Kells which is just beautiful and busy but glad I got to go in first thing in the morning as the queue to get in is out the door by the time I get out. Once you see the Book after wandering around the rooms explaining how the books were written and decorated etc, you go upstairs to The Long Room which is an old library, it used to be just one level but once it was full of books the roof was lifted to create another floor of shelves - it is a beautiful room!!! Can't get near the books themselves to see the titles alas but if you are a scholar and need to see a book you can ask for it and see it....

After this I check out the souvenier shop before walking outside, another grey and rainy day.. 😞 so I head off to the Killarney Cafe for a strawberry tart and orange juice to fortify myself before wandering around the city looking at the shops and the buildings - I didn't go into any museums etc am just happy looking at the architecture and taking photos of that instead. I walk back to our hotel Maldoro along the River Liffey and take photos of a ship (brigantine type) and a new bridge being built near the hotel.

One thing to note about Dublin are the doors which come in many different colours such as yellow, red, green, black and brown and varying shades thereof and they sometimes have pillars and/or lintels and/or glass arches etc - they all seem different in some little way!!

Tonight I get ready and manage to catch the bus to go to our Irish Night out where there was lots of signing and dancing and eating to be had!!! This place had a heap of different tour groups there but was still a great night.. Some people had some issues thinking that the drinks were included and finding out at the end of the night that they weren't!!!! oops!!!!

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