May 25-26 Dublin

Day 17 - Saturday, May 24, 2002

Breakfast started at 8:30 at the B&B, so we decided to get up early and see Glendalough. We discovered that we should have done this more often. It was beautiful and we were all alone. We got there at about 7:00 AM and just wandered around, took pictures and just enjoyed the peaceful setting. We headed back to the B&B for breakfast, (nothing special) and then packed and headed out. It was getting later in the morning and being Saturday, we guessed Powerscourt would be packed so we decided to take the road to Sally Gap. On the way we passed a beautiful waterfall (don't be fooled by the small one you see first), but it was a little hard to get a good view of it. After you pass the fall you enter an area that has no tress at all. This is a very strange and barren area and it goes for miles. Spectacular in it's starkness, but very unexpected after the lush scenery of the vales. At Sally Gap we came upon what appeared to be people gathering for some bike race. Somehow a van had driven into a ditch and had no hope of getting out. The road was pretty well blocked and I was considering helping with the pushing, but they had more than enough people struggling in vain. My tiny Nissan Micra told me that there was just enough room for me to sneak around the road block, so I did and we made our way towards Dublin. Little did we realize that we must have done something wrong somewhere because we were on our way to getting lost. As you come into the city on R115, you find yourself with a spectacular view over Dublin and the bay. The problem with R115 is that it does not have a junction onto M50. Well, we found ourselves in various traffic jams, and eventually asked for directions and as it turned out, were very close to M50. We made it to the airport, turned in the car and found the Aircoach to the city center all without incident.

The walk from Trinity College to Jury's Christchurch was a workout, but we survived. I used the force and found it easily. Jury's isn't ultra luxury, but it is certainly very nice, clean and comfortable and the rooms are substantially larger than what you would get around Victoria Station in London for anything close to the price. Our room looked out over the Christchurch Cathedral.

We had intended on doing the oh-so-touristy "Dublin's Viking Adventure", but alas, they were out of business. We did Dublinia instead, which was OK, but didn't have any cool rides or anything like the York exhibitions had. Hey, we like being kids every once in a while. Dinner at McGuires. They brew their own beer there and I had the stout which was very good. Unfortunately, the stout and beef was so salty, it was hard to eat. I managed somehow.

I had arranged to do the Zozimus Ghost Tour and that turned out to be a lot of fun. Our tour guide had us wandering through the streets of Dublin around the castle and Christchurch and various characters from Dublin's past jumped out from alleys and the like making attempts at frightening us. As with most tours, the guide pulled various people from the tour to have a more participatory role. I was chosen for a most humiliating job: that of a young wench who had left this dreadful old fellow. I was to lure him to the gates with my charming and sexy attitude. The fact that I was in the depths of a cold did not aid me in the use of my falsetto. I was a dismal failure. It seemed appropriate that the moon was full that night.

We finished the evening with drinks with the cast at their favorite pub.

Day 18 - Sunday, May 26, 2002

Did the hop on - hop off tour. Visited Guinness (of course) and bought some cool stuff and continued the tour. After the Guinness stop, we went back to the room to drop off the loot from the store. We decided to try Burdocks Fish and Chips, advertised as the best in all of Dublin. It was right around the corner from the hotel. Well, it was certainly the greasiest I had ever had and the flavor was good, but the grease was a bit overwhelming. I ate as much as I could stand in the room and then we went to the hotel pub to get a snack that would fill up Felicity. She didn't like the fish at all.

We jumped back on the bus and ended up on O'Connell St. Wandered around a bit, did a bit more shopping and stopped for a snack at Bewley's. Nothing to write home about....sort of an Irish Furr's with good tea. I had something that was supposed to be like a frappacino and, well, it wasn't. We wandered around a bit more and headed back to the room to pack.

I was not terribly impressed with Dublin. I'm sure I could have caught some theater there or found a great restaurant, but there are lots of places with great theater and restaurants. I'll definitely make it just a first or last night stop in future visits.

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