delightful Dublin

Dublin
Day One (May 14)


We arrived in Dublin in the late afternoon.  After checking into our hostel, we walked around the Temple Bar area for a while.  Somehow, we ended up getting dinner in an American-themed restaurant:  Thunder Road.  The Irish pubs were all pretty busy since it was Saturday night

After dinner, we went to a few pubs, including the famous Temple Bar.  Though it was Saturday night, we were pretty tired from our flight/travel, so we headed back to the hostel pretty early.

Day Two (May 15)


We spent a very Irish morning for our first day of sightseeing in Dublin.  Our first destination was the Guinness Storehouse.  On a cloudy Sunday in May, the Storehouse is far less busy than on March 18, the day after St. Patrick's.  There wasn't even a line!

The self-guided tour was exactly as I remembered it from March.  We went through the various stages and got our samples of Guinness Draught, like I did before.  However, Ashley, Anna and I must have skipped a few floors when we were here, because Joe and I also went through the advertising section.  Apparently, nothing says Guinness like a toucan.

At the pour your own pint section, the lady was much more helpful than the guys at the little stand was in March.  We enjoyed our free pints and made a quick stop at the Galaxy Bar for the 360 degree views of Dublin.

Our next stop was the Jameson Distillery.  The tour here was guided.  The distillery in Dublin is no longer in use, so it was set up to look like it would have when it was in use.  One of my favorite parts of the Jameson tour was how they did samples.  Unlike the Famous Grouse/Glenturret Distillery, the samples here were genuine drinks rather than plastic shot cups.  You also were given the option of straight whiskey or whiskey with mixer.

We headed to Temple Bar area after the distillery, where we grabbed a quick lunch before we began filming for Joe's Joe Goes... piece.  It turned out to be more difficult here than in Amsterdam to get interviews.  It also began raining, so we only got half of the filming done.

That night, we went to a few pubs in the Temple Bar area again.  In one, we met some Englishmen on a stag night (bachelor's party) who recognized Joe from Beauty and the Geek six years ago.  Crazy!

Day Three (May 16)


Our last day in Dublin began with finishing sightseeing, the first stop being Christchurch Cathedral.  We decided not to go inside, but walked around the exterior of the cathedral.

Instead, when we went to St. Patrick's Cathedral, we went inside.  We also spent some time in St. Patrick's Green--the park behind the cathedral.

After we went to the cathedral, we attempted to go to Dublin Castle.  However, it appeared to be closed off and there were a number of policemen around.  It turns out that it was closed off because the Queen (of the UK) was going to be arriving in Dublin the next day.

As we discovered throughout the day, it's a pretty controversial issue in Dublin, since a monarch hasn't visited since before Elizabeth was alive.

Since Dublin Castle wasn't open, we decided to walk around by Trinity College--which turned out to be a better area to interview people for Joe Goes... 

After we finished filming, we decided to head to the Writer's Museum.  However, as we headed up O'Connell Street, we were stopped by police who questioned us and searched our bags.  Security for the Queen's visit was quite the big deal.  But, they let us through and we made it to the museum.

For dinner, we went to the oldest pub in Ireland, The Brazen Head, est. 1198.  We went to Temple Bar area after dinner for a final pint before turning in.