Dublin

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Two days in Dublin

We started with the Red bus tour. Always a good way to get your bearings and an overview of what’s to do and see. Great personal and humours commentary by our guide. Two days! Who decided two days? What to do? Now feeling a great case of FOMO…If in doubt head to the shops. Just as overwhelming there, although I manged to make a couple purchases. Back to O’Connell street for the 3 o’clock “1916” tour. This year is the 100yr anniversary of the Easter uprising of 1916. Excellent young guide who was so enthusiastic about the history of Dublin and the 1916 uprising, he was able to show us by walking us around the different locations and points of reference of what actually happened, when and where that Easter, and how it changed the future of Ireland. Really worthwhile and informative to those who previously had a shady knowledge. We were shown photos of how the O’Connell street buildings and the GPO were largely destroyed and 450 people died. Two hundred of those civilians and 50 of them children. The son, aged 7, of the local pharmacist stepped outside his dad’s shop and was never seen again. It has only been established recently that he got caught up in crossfire and was buried in a mass grave without being identified at the time. Off to the pub for a traditional pub dinner. Suited my driver well. As our accommodation is directly across the road from the Gate Theatre we booked ourselves into see “The Constant Wife” by Somerset Maugham. Lovely old theatre, but the set and the costumes were outstanding by our experience. The set was made up of 1920’s authentic pieces and the costumes were of ‘Downtown Abbey’ standard. The actors and actress were fabulous and the best bit, I reckon, is that we were across the road and in bed before the theatre was empty!

Day two, back on the red bus to the Trinity College. The premier college of Ireland founded by QE I. We were early enough, conveniently to miss the que for the Book of Kells the most important book in Ireland. This is a copy of the four Gospels; Mathew, Mark, Luke and John that were scribed by hand onto velum in about 800 ad. The hand work printing and drawing is astounding when you consider the materials available to them at the time. Upstairs to the Long Room which houses the Trinity Library. Under statute, the Library has the right to house every copy of every book published in Ireland or the UK. At the moment the count has got to 5 million. The university itself has 15,000 students. Next stop the St Patrick Cathedral. Built to honour St Patrick the patron saint of Ireland who arrived about 450ad and started baptising people into Christianity. Still a popular bloke today. Other important facts are that Jonathan Swift was the dean here at one time and was famous and much loved for far more than writing Gulliver’s Travels. Every year in April they perform Handel’s Messiah in honour of the fact that it was while Handel was here that Messiah was first performed publicly. Not in the cathedral then, they wouldn’t give it to him but they did loan him a1wchoir and he went down the road to a music hall and performed it the first time in front of 700 people. It immediately went to the top of the pops.

Time to split up with himself as I had a hair appointment and the nails. Off he went to the Jameson Distillery and of course the famous Guinness brewery.

It’s not every day that one can have a wee dram of whiskey made by a Scotsman in Ireland. A very nice dram indeed. John Jameson set up his distillery in what is now down town Dublin in 1780. As usual access to good water and markets was the basis for the location. The downside was that the barley was grown 100 miles away resulting in the Distillery now located in Cork with the bottling and packing still in Dublin. Jameson whiskey is made from both malted and un-malted barley, triple distilled and aged in used bourbon and sherry casks. The malting and aging in used cask impart a distinctive flavour to the whiskey while the triple distilling makes it a lot smoother than Bourbon (single) or Scotch (double). Naturally we had to sample all three (Jameson’s, Black Label Johnny Walker and Jack Daniels) to appreciate this. Not the best prelude to a half hour trek over to a brewery.

What a place, Guinness Brewery on 55 acres of a 9,000 year leased site in Dublin that allowed special access to the Dublin’s water supply. The brewery consumes 100,000 tonnes of malted, un-malted and roasted barley per year and 8million litres of water per day to form the basis of the most famous flavoured dark beer in the world. With all the product made on one site and shipped all over the world at time in their own ships. The visitor centre is 7 floors high with your complementary pint available on the 7^th floor glass walled bar with 360o views over Dublin. I was now “feeling no pain” J

Have you heard the Irish weather joke? It rained twice last week, once for three days and once for four days.

Ireland – Words of Association

Country homes, mashed Potato, rain, flowers, pubs, skinny roads, stone cottages, green

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