Sunday, November 23, 2014

One From Dublin

You may have heard that the Guinness in Dublin tastes better and you would have heard right!

We have just returned from a two day mini break to this wonderful and vibrant city and if we could, we would return tomorrow.

It was early in the evening as our coach pulled up in front of our hotel for the next two nights, the ....... .......... The end of a twelve hour journey which had started early that day with a taxi ride to the bus station to join our coach and onwards to Ireland. After a long coach journey and a trip across the Irish sea on the ferry, our hotel was a sight for sore eyes (perhaps sore bottoms would be more apt) but there was no time for relaxation as our time in Dublin was limited and we wanted to make the most of it!

We dumped our bags after briefly checking out our room then headed out of the hotel looking up and down O'Connell Street trying to decide which direction we were heading.

We soon ended up crossing the Liffey and entering a lively and photogenic area of bars and restaurant's, choosing not to enter any of them until we'd found the famed Temple Bar and checked out the area enough to settle our curiosity.

Temple Bar ended up being our first port of call and straight away we were onto a winner,it was very busy with people from all over the world sat or stood around talking and mingling and drinking pint's of Guinness mainly but also ales, lager's and wines. Bands were playing Irish folk, pub classics and popular songs, a musical theme which ran through all the pubs it seemed. It had to be Guinness for my first choice of drink and wow, what a revelation a taste sensation, and so it went until after two more when we decided to move to somewhere slightly quieter for something to eat.

Some good food in the next pub and then we moved on to one or two more pubs before the long journey (and the Guinness) started to take it's toll and we headed back to our hotel.

After breakfast we headed out again for a stroll around the shops and onto the Guinness tour, three hours of everything Guinness including learning how to pour the perfect pint of the stuff, a wonderful morning ending around lunch time at the top of the Guinness factory with a cold pint and an excellent panoramic view. 

We left around lunchtime and headed for something to eat before going back to the temple bar area for another pub crawl before going back to the hotel for an early night and an early get up for a rather rough crossing of the Irish sea back to Hollyhead, and homeward bound on our coach.

So if you haven't tried Dublin then I highly recommend it!

I played about with this photo I took in Dublin and quite liked how it turned out!