Saturday, March 6, 2010

Ireland trip, days 8 and 9: Dublin

Well, Friday wasn't really worth reporting... went to work, taught all day, love my job, you know. After class, I rejoined Tuti, Granny, and e-baby back at the apartment and we had a leisurely dinner in. I needed the rest, since I have caught another cold, and this one is entirely in my ears. OUCH! I am half deaf (more than normal, heh) and the pressure inside my ears makes me wonder whether I'll have a ruptured eardrum. I hope not, but we fly home Monday morning so I'm a little nervous.

This morning was my first full day to really see Dublin, and I've been itching to do the historical walking tour of Dublin ever since I read about it in October. It did not disappoint. The guide was a history graduate of Trinity college and he clearly loves his job. He told us at the beginning that this was less of a tour and more of an attempt to squeeze 3000 years of history into 2 hours, an ambitious goal. While I already knew the large moving parts of Irish history, the tour filled in a lot of the gaps I had, and cleared up a lot of the confusion I've had over the Catholic/Protestant wars over the centuries.

After the tour we had lunch at the market in Temple Bar, and split up: Tuti took e-baby home for a nap, Granny went in search of tickets to a performance of Mozart's Requiem at St Patrick's cathedral, and I wandered Temple Bar and bought way too many souvenirs.

Dublin's a fine city, but it's no Galway. The old parts of town have beautiful architecture. It's the off season now, and the streets are so crowded with people that it isn't comfortable. I imagine that in the high season, it's horrible.

Tomorrow's our last day here. I'm not sure what I want to do. It's a SUnday so lot sof places will be closed. If the weather's nice, I'll look for a playground so that e-baby can have a nice final day of vacation.

1 comment:

Cat said...

test test test