Day 2 - Why Not Tour a Distillery on Friday the 13th?

Love love love the Raymond Chandler quote on the edge of the mezzanine! Just inside Bow Street Distillery.

We slept in, of course. Originally, the morning hours included visiting Drimnagh Castle, but we decided to save that castle in a southern suburban-ish part of the city for another day, take our time walking to the Bow Street Distillery, and see what sights we might see along the way. We grabbed a loaf of bread and some other provisions from a nearby M&S Simply Food. It was a great little store for hotel-sojourners, with a decent coffee machine and a small patisserie station. I even found ready-made roasted veggie sandwiches there. We had a lazy breakfast in our hotel room and then set off to find Bow Street. Here are some things we saw along the way.

We stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn Customs House, so had to get a shot of this.

A Daniel McConnell monument. Not the last one we saw while we were in Ireland.

Not sure what this building is, but it looks important!

We may have taken a longer route to get there than was absolutely necessary, probably on more narrow old cobblestone streets than we had to, but we enjoyed it. Finally, ta-da!

Our tour guide was from County Cork, where Jameson whisky is currently distilled. The facility on Bow Street in Dublin serves mainly as a museum and gift shop these days. Oh, and let's not forget, a place to taste and compare! Not to mention being entertained by a witty tour guide telling stories as you compare the smell, taste of this grain and that, one malted, one not, or peer at the side of your shot glass under the light to look for the tiny bubbles or "tears" that form when the whisky coats the inside. Also, learned that the Latin words (Sine Metu) in the Jameson crest mean "without fear," awarded to Jameson because he fought off pirates.

We finished our tour, had our end-of-tour drinks (you could have either a glass of grog or a shot of whisky), and made our gift shop purchases. Time to head back and maybe look for some lunch. :

We found this big bell right outside the distillery. Couldn't really make out where it was from, or much else, but it looked kind of familiar, maybe in the way all big bells remind of other big bells . . .

Anyway, as we got closer to the river, I got a shot of this Dublin landmark:

The Ha'penny Bridge

And I'm a sucker for those plaques or signs that provide more information, so here they are, in an order that makes sense to me:

And then some more photos taken on our walk back toward our room, just because-flowerboxes!

And a more complete photo of the Samuel Beckett Bridge:

We then visited the Trinity College Campus (but too late to get in to see the Book of Kells, arrrgh!)

Provost Salmon. You can scan a bar code on your phone, resulting in an iPhone marimba ringtone sounding and a voice, purporting to be Provost Salmon, telling you all about himself and Trinity College during his long, long tenure as Provost. In probably unrelated information, there is also an old Irish legend about a Salmon of Knowledge, and a boy (Fionn, if I remember correctly) who never had to ask anyone another question again after he'd tasted the salt from its skin while sucking on a wound that occurred as he was cooking it for the master for whom he was apprenticing. He'd always know the answer as soon as he put his thumb in his mouth.

Sphere in a Sphere

Just a lovely old tree

We felt like we'd put in another pretty good day of sightseeing and museum-visiting, so we started walking back toward the Custom House Quay and our room. Saw this on the way back, and made me think of the bank in Mary Poppins. I mean, we have pretty big bank buildings at home, but geez:

Also took a photo of the base of one of the streetlights

And then there was this eye-catching installation:

And a closer shot:

And the plaque with pertinent info:

We grabbed some more provisions at the M&S Simply Food place, took them up to our room and ate a simple supper, then opened one of our Jameson purchases and had a sip or two. Enough to make me want something crunchy and salty. Found these in the hotel lobby's "pantry."

Lovely packaging, but no discernible difference in taste from the sour cream and onion crisps/chips I've tasted at home in the U.S. Cute cow!

Went to bed looking forward to seeing our younger son, Joseph, his wife, Chelsea, and our precious Grand-Emma in the morning!

First Day in Dublin

Wednesday, June 11, 2018, 10:00a.m.

Almost finished packing. Cliff has sent an email to inform me of our "itinerary" for next week. He has us signed up for something every day. We'll be in Dublin tomorrow morning, at 9:00a.m. local  time, less than 24 hours from now -- they're 5 hours ahead. He also attached a picture of the weather forecast in County Clare next week.  Saw in the news that Prince Harry and Meghan will also be in Irelenad. Weather looks airish. I'll throw a couple of sweaters in the carry on.

6:30p.m.
Got to the airport before 5:00p.m. Went straight through TSA protocols, no removing shoes or anything. Got to my gate by  5:30. Had enough time to walk the concourse a couple of times before boarding, and was sitting at the gate again by 6:30, realizing it was 11:30 in Dublin, and hoping I'd be able to sleep on the plane. Spoiler alert, didn't sleep much on the plane. not sure how anyone does.  In my seat by 7:51, checked in on Facebook.



Thursday, July 12, 10:50a.m.

Here at the Hilton Garden Inn Customs House. They let us go ahead and check in! The cab ride here from the airport was a new experience, but I was sitting on the left side of the back seat. For some reason, seeing the driver in the front right didn't seem so disorienting. The driver mentioned that they haven't been getting much rain lately, and that the grass wasn't very green. Cliff, getting away from the desert for a couple of weeks, remarked that it looked pretty green to him!  Our hotel window overlooks the River Liffey.

Our cab driver informed us that we could walk along the riverwalk and into the city center.

You can see part of the Jeannie Johnston (replica of emigrant ship) from our window (if you lean forward and peer out from the very far side). The shot on the bottom right was taken using a bit of zoom.

Perusing a copy of the local paper that someone had given Cliff while he was waiting for me at the airport, I learned that Prince Harry and Meghan had finished their visit in Dublin the day before.

This inspired a walk to the Famine Memorial, which was a very short walk from our room.

Everyone seems to get quiet and serious when walking through and around these statues, understandably so. The atmosphere reminded me a bit of being in the Musee des Deportees behind Notre Dame in Paris, it inspires meditative reflection, and perhaps (and hopefully) some empathy. Here's the dedication plaque, set in the pavement.

12:50p.m. Now, on an entirely different note--
Our first meal in Ireland? Vegan pizza at a restaurant called Milano's.

The menu listed polenta chips as one of the side items.
I was intrigued. The waitress felt obliged to inform us that these did not contain potatoes.

I must confess, I was expecting something that looked more like what I would call chips, having forgotten that they would dub those "crisps." I was also still going on very little sleep. Couldn't sleep in the plane, and sure couldn't sleep while there was still daylight in Dublin.

After lunch, we stopped in to see what the EPIC right next door to our hotel was all about. 

This is right outside EPIC: The Irish Emigration Museum. We did visit, and it was well worth the time and money we spent there, but we decided to find some other things in Dublin first. Specifically, I wanted to find the statue of Oscar Wilde I'd read so much about, especially after I checked Google Maps and found out it was only a 23 minute walk from where we were, in Merrion Park.  Got a little confused trying to follow Google Maps. A kind lady walking a bicycle across the street asked if she could help. When she heard we were looking for Merrion Park, she said, "Oscar Wilde, right? I nodded, then she smiled while telling me all about Sweny's the pharmacy frequented regularly by James Joyce, that we'd pass on the way to see Oscar. Turns out she does some voluntary work there and she informed me that there are literary readings there, and would be one that evening. I thought that might be exciting if I hadn't just arrived after spending all night in a plane. But we found Sweny's, and then Merrion Park, and Oscar. Also took a walk around a small bit of Merrion Park, which includes a playground and is otherwise a lovely green space in the city center.

On the way back, we passed Sweny's on its side of the road, so I could read some of the signs advertising which days of the week Ulysses is read in which languages. Looked like a different language almost every day of the week.

At some point during all of that, I took a picture of what, I learned later, is the Samuel Beckett Bridge. Actually, I took a partial photo of the bridge. Cliff suggested that I take a photo that included one of the charming streetlights in the foreground.

I also noticed building with a striking feature:

Didn't get close enough to discover anything else about it until Wednesday, but I'll spare you the suspense 😏

After all of that, we visited the Irish Emigration Museum. They give you a "passport" when you purchase your entry, and in each gallery (20 of them), there's a place to stamp your passport, showing that you've been through.  We spent a solid two hours exploring all the interactive installations, but I didn't get any photos because I downloaded the museum's app, and used it as a guide for the first part of the tour.  My favorite interactive gadget was a replica of a giant open book. A flashing dotted line indicated when you should sweep your had across it, as if to turn a page. Each page turn started a clip about a famous author from Ireland. There was also a gadget that featured a quiz about Irish pubs in Ireland and around the world. I only missed one question, which, the gadget informed me, made me a barfly. No comments, please. 

I am very glad I still have the app, and looking forward to listening to the narration for each gallery again soon. Looking back, someone must have felt like it takes an entire museum experience to begin to explain why anyone ever left this green, temperate island. I sure didn't want to.

We had dinner at the hotel restaurant (Oly's). I feel like I really made the most of this first day, especially for someone who flew in on an overnight flight during which I may have dozed off for a few minutes once or twice. I was a sight-seeing machine. Also, I slept very well after our first day in Dublin.