Happy Easter everyone! I never dreamed I would be spending Easter
in Ireland. We have been so busy the days seem to fly by.
I want to give a few impressions I have
had so far of Ireland. I'm no expert on traveling, so these opinions are just
that, my opinions. Ireland is a very beautiful country. It is so green and
lush. It has a nice mix of old architecture and modern mixed in. I love how
they have tried to blend the two together so seamlessly. The people are so nice
and polite. I think Ireland is definitely worth a trip here. I could see how it
would be so easy for someone to relocate here. The food prices are a little
high, and so is the alcohol according to an exchange student I have spent some
time talking to. She did say that the rest is not as expensive here. I really
didn’t check out the shopping, as I am not here to shop. I will say that Italy
is still my favorite place. Sam would tell you I am just biased, but I went to
Italy with someone who isn’t a lot of fun, and traveling with Sam is a lot more
fun and relaxing to me. So it wasn’t the company, it was the country to me.
Today we slept in. We didn’t get to sleep until late and we were
exhausted, so we slept to 9:30. After a quick shower and dressing, we had
breakfast in the hotel restaurant. In America, we could go grab breakfast in
our pajamas. Here, they expect you to dress appropriately to eat. They even
have signs posted stating this. We had what they call the traditional Irish
breakfast that must consist of eggs and sausage. The yogurt is not the
sweetened kind, so it took some getting used to. It had blueberries in it, but
no sugar. There was fruit to choose from, coffee, tea, and juices. There was a
station to have cereal if you wanted that instead. It was good and filling. Sam
and I were just glad they had coffee.
After getting our fill, we finished getting ready for the day and
set out for the Guinness Storehouse. We have chosen to walk to most of the
places we want to visit. They really aren’t that far, and you get to know the
city that much better. It wasn’t very far, and we enjoyed the walk. The
building is huge. We went in and purchased our tickets. The first stop on the
tour is the gift shop. We did some browsing and then decided to start the tour.
It is mostly a self guided tour. It is set up using a ton of video being run on
loops. You can stop at each station and listen to the video and then move to
the next station. When we were approximately half way done, we ran into our new
friends from the day before, the Barb’s. We really liked them and visited with them
for a while and then left them at the snack shop and continued on. At the pour
your own pint station, we ended up in their group again. From there we
continued on with them to The Gravity Bar at the very top of the building. This
is a round bar entirely made of glass windows, giving you a 360 degree view of
Dublin. The view is breath taking. We all drank our pints and had a great time
visiting. I am glad we met them and got to see them again today. They are a
very nice family who we had a great time hanging with. We said our goodbyes and
we left to continue our journey.
After leaving Guinness, it was raining. This is typical Ireland
weather and we realized how blessed we had been for the past two days. It was
lunch time and I really wanted my fish and chips. We decided to go to Fitzgerald’s
Pub. This is one of the pubs that was highly recommended for the atmosphere and
has been around since 1861. We were not disappointed. As soon as you walk in,
you feel as if you are back in time. It is the kind of pub you imagine in your
head. We walked past the bar area to the back and found a table. Around the
sides, there are booths, some of which are situated in little cubby type rooms
and can be used for a more private area. We chose to sit at a table in the
middle of the room. We ordered our fish and chips and pint. I tried a different
kind of beer. It wasn’t as dark as a Guinness. The fish and chips are served on
a wooden board and the chips come in the little basket they are fried in. The
food was delicious and it was fun to see some of the locals around the room.
Dublin has many tourists and where ever you go, you tend to find you are not
the only tourists there.
After finishing our meal, we wanted to go see if we could get into
the museum. We stepped outside into the rain again. It wasn’t a downpour, but
it was enough to make you get wet. We decided to step into a tour station to
see how far we had left for the museum. Sam asked for directions and we were
surprised that it was already 6 and the museum had closed. We also found out it
was closed on Mondays, so we will not get to see the Bog People Sam wanted to
see. Unfortunately, this weekend was a little hard for us to get into
everything due to the holiday.
Since the museum was out, we decided to just walk around and see
what we could see. We headed in the direction of Dublin Castle. We were pretty
sure we wouldn’t get into anything at that hour, but what better experience to
see Dublin in its typical weather. We found Christ’s Church and walked around
it for a while. We found Dublina and looked at what we could see from the
outside. We then found the Dublin Castle and walked around it and read about it
on the plaques. The castle is huge and is used today for various offices. Bram
Stoker worked in the castle at one time, as did his father.
We then just decided to walk around the streets in no particular
direction. We went back to the Temple Bar District and then decided our feet
hurt and I was feeling a little damp, so we headed back to the hotel. We have
walked many miles a day and everywhere we have gone, stairs and hills have been
involved. We were tired and it had begun to rain again. So we stayed in the
hotel bar, had a pint of another kind of beer that was recommended by the
bartender, and some chicken wings. We sat at the window and people watched. We
discussed what we had liked so far and what we didn’t. Neither of us could come
up with a dislike, we had too many things to have a favorite, so far. Tomorrow
night we are pretty sure will be our favorite of Ireland, but you will have to
read tomorrow’s to see what that is.
No comments:
Post a Comment