A place I have always dreamed of visiting is
Ireland. Since I was young something
about it called out to my heart and I knew I would never be satisfied unless I
saw the lush greenery of its countryside in person. So with our final adventure before returning
to Canada we decided that Ireland was the place to travel to. It did not
disappoint.
We found an apartment on Airbnb to rent that was
fairly close to the center of town. Now
I have always been a little weary of Airbnb because I don’t trust that the people
renting the apartments (or rooms if you go that way) are not murderers. I have terrible thoughts that they will
return to the apartment at night as we are sleeping and then we are in our own
horror movie. Luckily, however, that was
not the case this time and our host was amazing. He met us outside at the bus
stop, which was very conveniently right around the corner, and told us all
about the neighbourhood. He had maps,
snacks and even a gift bag with chocolates and postcards for us! It was super helpful and made me feel very
comfortable.
If you are travelling think about Airbnb it can
save you money and sometimes you meet really cool people.
Dublin is a really interesting city and one of
the friendliest places I have ever been!
And that is saying a lot I mean I am Canadian. It was incredible Ross and I would be
standing on the sidewalk looking around at everything and people would ask if
we needed help finding things or if we were lost. Everyone was happy and smiling all the time
and the atmosphere just made you feel welcome.
I think I smiled the entire week.
We had a week of adventure planned for the city
so we of course wasted no time getting up and out on our first morning! As we all know Ross and I like to explore a
city on foot so we took our map and headed straight to the center after a quick
stop at Starbucks of course. Dublin is a
big city but certainly small enough to walk around and see all the major sights
if you have a few days.
Lets start with the Temple Bar area. I had heard about the actual Temple Bar and
knew it was a place I wanted to go but I hadn’t realized there was an entire
area surrounding it that was even cooler than the bar itself! Tons of pubs, restaurants and neat shops lined
the cobblestone streets. The area was
vibrant and alive and it was so cool to actually go to an Irish pub in
Ireland! Of course it is very touristy
and I loved it. Basically every pub had
live music each night, Guinness flowed freely, people were dancing and singing
and the vibe was friendly and fun.
The food was interesting and as always if you are
a meat eater there are many traditional Irish dishes for you to try. For us finding actual Irish food that is
vegetarian was not easy however there were tons of options for us so it was not
a problem. We had Indian, Turkish,
Chinese, and of course a few stops for burritos and pizza. Plus, having an actual apartment to stay in
means you can cook food yourself so we hit up some grocery shops and made lots
at home. We only went out for breakfast on our first and last day there and it
was awesome. Basically every pub or
restaurant has a huge traditional breakfast and many serve it all day which is
awesome.
Some wonderful points of interest in the city
were Saint Stephens Green which is a gorgeous garden park. It is full of lovely trees, flowers, ponds
and has a myriad of paths to follow so you could always find a new route to
take. It was nice to be there in the
spring although I imagine summer is even more beautiful.
I also highly recommend you adventure to Trinity
college for some beautiful green space and interesting buildings to marvel
at. Founded in 1592 the college was
modelled after such Universities as Oxford and Cambridge however only one
college was ever established. What makes this college so interesting to me
however is the fact that both Bram Stoker and Oscar Wilde attended it and that
makes my bibliophile heart flutter.
Most importantly we visited the Guinness
Storehouse. It was a very interesting
tour so if you are in Dublin be sure to check it out. It is huge so give yourself a few hours –
especially if you plan on sticking around after the tour to enjoy some
beer. It is a self guided tour so we
were able to spend as much time as we liked in each area learning about Arthur
Guinness, his family and his vision. Apparently he was so certain about his beer he signed a 9000-year lease
on the property! Incredible.
Once we finished with the main tour we had the
opportunity to go to Guinness academy where we learned how to pour the perfect
pint which we got to drink afterwards of course. It was fun learning the proper technique to
get the best head. After we drank that
and Ross swiped another pint off a table (they clearly poured it and left it
there with no intention of drinking it and why let it go to waste?) we went up
to the Skybar to get a great view of the city.
I think it is important to mention that Guinness
in Ireland is not the same as the Guinness at home in Canada. The flavour was the same but I didn’t find it
was as thick so you could drink more than one pint without feeling totally
full.
We wanted to make sure we got to see as much of
Ireland as possible while we were there so we took a few day trips to other
parts of the island. Our first trip was
to Belfast. It was a very livable city
but not a place I thought was great for tourists. There is of course the Titanic museum and the
Titanic memorial garden which I really enjoyed.
It was interesting to be in a city where the Titanic is more then just a
story of a great tragedy. It was built there
and so many people in the city were actually affected by its construction and
sinking.
Otherwise the city was a little sleepy. It had everything you would need to live
there but not much in the way of attractions.
We did however have some yummy coffee and snacks ever in the university
area. I think there are other places
that would be more interesting to visit if you are ever in Ireland.
One of those places was The Cliffs of Moher. We took a bus tour with a company called
Paddy Wagon Tours. It was relatively
cheap for the experience. We paid 40
Euros each and had an entire day of travel with a cool tour guide. The Irish countryside is exactly what I
expected and it was enchanting. We stopped at some great castle ruins and
interesting places on the coast. He told
us tales of Ireland and lots of fascinating history.
Of course the cliffs themselves were
amazing. As we got there a storm started
to blow in which made it very wet, cold and kind of dangerous on the edges but
it was haunting and beautiful at the same time.
The fog rolling in around the cliffs made it feel more exhilarating – in
my opinion. All I wanted to do was sit
and stare out at the edge of the world as the wind whipped my face and the ocean
air delighted my olfactory senses.
We wandered around the top of the cliffs for
about an hour until we were too wet to carry on then headed back to the
bus. Our guide took is for a delicious
lunch at an old pub somewhere near the coast and although the vegetarian meal
was completely sold out they made us a huge platter of vegetables, mashed
potatoes, soup, bread and rice. It was
so good and so comforting.
I absolutely recommend Paddy Wagon Tours!
The last trip we did was just simple. We caught the intercity train and went to a
small town called Dalkey. It was a quiet
and very cute little area right on the coast so it made a great wander for the
late afternoon. We spent a lot of time
just walking through a posh little neighbour hood looking at the gorgeous
houses. And of course no day trip would
be complete without some yummy snacks so we made sure to grab some carrot cake
and tea at a cute café before heading back into the city.
There was a spot there where we could use a
telescope to look out at Dalkey Island. It
is only 16km from Ireland and is accessible by boat. There are artifacts that
have been found on the island that show there were people living there in the
Mesolithic period! However now the
island is now completely uninhabited except for about 20 goats and a whole lot
of rabbits! Nobody claims to know how
the goats got there. With the telescope
we could see the remains of an old church, houses and a watchtower. It was a nice place to visit.
Stay tuned for a quick little write up about our
day trip to Glasgow!
No comments:
Post a Comment