Our trip to Ireland ...
September 2012
Day 2 ... Tuesday, September 18
We landed in Dublin about 10 AM their time. The
security/customs procedure was a breeze and we were met in the
airport lobby by Tom Quinn, our tour director. After all of
the group members scheduled to arrive there were accounted for, he
escorted us to the bus where we met Paddy O'Donnell, our
driver. These two guys were a blast and really made the
trip.
We arrived at Temple Bar about noon. Temple Bar is a
section of town where it is happening! This is the social
part of town with pubs everywhere you go and nightlife
around the clock. We stayed at the Temple Bar Hotel on Fleet
Street for three nights. After getting our baggage into our
room, the four of us strolled down the street. We were just
about next door to a Hard Rock Cafe, but we wanted to get lunch at
a local Irish place. We found a pub called Oliver St. John
Gogarty's. Gogarty was a real person who was the inspiration
for Buck Mulligan in James Joyce's novel Ulysses.
We strolled around town for the afternoon until dinner as a
group at the hotel, which was exceptional. We then did the
"pub crawl", which is the Irish equivalent to our
"bar hopping". By the end of the evening, we had
sampled Guinness, Smithwicks (regular) and Smithwicks Pale Ale,
Harps Lager, Bulmers Cider, Kilkenny and maybe a couple of
others! We found that Irish Guinness is much more palatable
than the American version. David's personal favorite was
Harp's Lager but we soon found that it isn't readily available
throughout the country. Marcia found Smithwicks (pronounced
Schmid-iks) to be her favorite. There were Irish musicians
at just about every pub we went into.
These pictures were all taken in Dublin.
on to day 3
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