Have you missed me? Yes, I'm back after a three month hiatus. What should I blog about after these long months? How about something that happened three months ago...Ireland! First - Dublin.
Our first flight ever on Ryanair was uneventful, but I must say the cattle call is quite disconcerting. The way people queue up you’d think they were handing out free turkeys at King Soopers the day before Thanksgiving. Come on people, we’re talking about plastic seats, boarding music that makes you feel like you are in video game, and customer service that screams, "I'd love my job, if these stupid customers would just go away!". Basically, it's an hour long ride on an inner-city bus, so where’s the need to get onboard in a hurry?
I don’t know why, but we weren't blown away by Dublin on our first day, despite all the great things we'd heard. Regardless, Stephen the student gave us a great tour of Trinity College Dublin, where we saw the 1200 year-old illuminated manuscript, The Book of Kells. We strolled through Temple Bar, saw Joyce’s “cat and the rat” at Christ Church Cathedral, learned the history of my beloved Minnesota Vikings at the otherwise very lame Dublinia, and cruised by St. Patrick’s Cathedral . . . which provided my only blog-worthy pic of the afternoon.
After days of begging, pleading, imploring, and beseeching, Simone indulged me by actually attending a Riverdance show (or as our friend refers to it, DanceDance). OK, it was Simone’s idea (dare I say, passion), but I went along with it, which is pretty big of me considering it was two straight hours of dancing (so the link is actually monkeys doing riverdance, but you get the idea).
Time for full disclosure. I secretly enjoyed the show, even enough to keep me from dreaming about the pints of Guinness I could be drinking in any number of classic Dublin pubs.
We ended the day with me a pint o' Guinness, and Simone a pint o' Bulmers in O’Neills pub, which also happened to be our B&B.
Day two in the city was all about Guinness, Irish pubs, and Jameson. And rain. Lots of rain. Here’s a pic of our view from the top of the Guinness Storehouse to give you an idea of the type of day it was in Dublin. A Perfect Irish Day.
The Guinness Storehouse, the brewery's original storehouse located at St. James Gate, has been restored and serves as a great example of adaptive reuse (can you tell my wife is a historic preservationist?). It is really cool . . . seven stories of beer bliss followed by a “free” pint of the dark stuff at the top of the building in a 360-degree glass-enclosed floating pub.
Before we did our next tour we decided to grab some lunch. Hmm, how about fish n’ chips at the oldest pub in Ireland? Don’t know what I’m actually doing in this picture, perhaps welcoming you to the Brazen Head, est. 1198.
We had a great couple of hours in the Brazen Head, conversing with the bar staff and our fellow patrons, and watching Usain Bolt’s amazing 100-meter Beijing run.
Not certain about this next picture though.
On to the Jameson Irish Whiskey tour! A local gentlemen at the Brazen Head told us to volunteer when they asked for volunteers at the end of the tour, so we took his good advice. We did a tasting of Scotch, Bourbon, and Irish Whiskey. I’m not a big fan of gasoline (aka Scotch). I've always been a Bourbon guy, but have never really given Irish Whiskey a chance. The triple distillation process really produces a very smooth beverage. I’m a convert. I still love my Evan Williams Single Barrel, but Jameson may have taken its place as my favorite whiskey.
Guinness, the Brazen Head, and Jameson. Mmmmm . . . Dublin restored on Day Two.
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