After a lovely breakfast, we met our tour guide (Cathal) in the lobby for our 5 hour walking tour of Dublin. The temp is 58 degrees and a light rain today, but cleared up around noon. Here are the highlights. It was a good, but exhausting day of walking about 4.5 miles.

• Old Parliament building, now Bank of Ireland

• Trinity College – old library and the Book of Kell’s. Established in 1592, the Freshers started this week. Only 800 of the 16,000 students live on campus. In the 18th century, it was known as the university of the Protestants. Women were admitted in 1904, but catholics were not admitted until 1970. The library is the oldest library in Ireland. The long room is stunning and houses about 200,000 of the library’s oldest books. We saw the library after viewing the Book of Kells. The book is Ireland’s greatest cultural treasure and the world’s most famous medieval manuscript dating back to 800AD. It was made my monks in Iona Scotland. It contains only 4 gospels. The book itself is small and only opened to 4 pages at a time. It is beautifully illustrated.

• City hall – which isn’t currently a city hall, now, but a location for weddings,

• St Stephens green – 22 acre/9 hectare park in the city, reopened to the public in 1880. We saw another famine statue when we entered, ponds with ducks, swan, and seagulls and the Fusilier arch that you could still see the bullet holes from Easter rising in 1916. Cathal sang us a song at the entrance by the famine statue.

• Bewleys Cafe – we stopped here half way through our tour for coffee , tea and scones. The stain glass windows by Harry Clarke were beautiful. Link
• Powerscourt Centre
• George Street Arcade
• Dublin Castle – Erected in the early thirteenth century on the site of a Viking settlement, Dublin Castle served for centuries as the headquarters of English, and later British, administration in Ireland. In 1922, following it was very crowded and obviously Ireland’s independence, Dublin Castle was handed over to the new Irish government. Much of the original castle had been destroyed, and rebuilt, but one tower remains. We walked around to the back side and had a much better view, saw the gardens. At the heart of the gardens is the grassy circle, where patterns of sea serpents are cut into the lawn. This lawn is near the site of the original dubh linn or ‘black pool’, where the Vikings harboured their ships and set up a trading base. It was this pool that gave its name to the city: Dublin.
• Christ Church Cathedral – was founded in 1028, and had been rebuilt. The Gothic/Romanesque architecture was interesting. The cathedral contains the tomb of Strongbow, he led the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland. We visited the crypt which was interesting, but not too exciting. We saw the mummified remains of a cat and rat. In 2012, the heart of Saint Laurence O’Toole, Archbishop of Dublin, was stolen from the cathedral. In 2018, the heart was recovered in Phoenix Park by Irish police. Gypsies supposedly stole it, felt cursed by it and left it in the park to be found.

Our tour stopped here, but we continued on to Saint Patrick’s cathedral. The stained glass here was beautiful. Mom found the Jonathan Swift, author of Gulliver’s Travels, interesting. He is buried in the church, and was a prolific writer and satirist. We expected this church to be much more ornate than Christ Church, but it wasn’t.

Our last stop of the day was the Guinness Storehouse. We had a self guided tour, learned about roasting barley, hops, yeast, fermenting, and storing. There were 7 floors, and we visited the Gravity Bar to see the panoramic views of the city. It was crowded and obviously a popular spot.

We went back to the hotel, chilled before heading out to dinner at the Blind Pig, a hidden speakeasy. We had a tough time finding it, but our meals were very good. Thanks John and Cathy for the recommendation.