May 5 - Dublin

Arrived in Dublin on Aer Lingus at 6:45 am Monday morning. The flight was due to arrive at 7:20 - we must have had a good tail wind. After we got our bags at the baggage carousel - not a long wait - not as long as a wait for bags at Dulles!! We decided to ask about the best way to get to downtown Dublin. Someone at the airport information desk told us that there is a bus that stops only two blocks away from the hotel for 7 euro per person. Well, that was much better than the 35 plus euro it would have been for a taxi. Luckily, the bus was there when we got outside and left within a matter of just a few minutes.

We got off the bus at Trinity College and once we were headed in the right direction, we found the Westin Dublin. We checked in but our room was not ready yet - it was only about 8:30am. We checked our bags with the hotel and proceeded outside to find some breakfast. Apparently, Aer Lingus does not serve breakfast in the back of the plane! Well, after realizing that Monday May 5 is a bank holiday in Dublin, and we couldn't find any place that was open for breakfast, we headed to McDonald's - even Burger King was closed.

We found out that Mc Donald's has a section of their "restaurant" called the Mc Cafe. And they make A GREAT latte!! Kevin said that it was the best coffee that he's had in a long time. After breakfast, we headed down Grafton Street to look around a bit to find that NOTHING was open before 10:00am. Not only did the bank holiday affect this, but most retail establishments did not open until then. One of the tours we had decided to take was a hop-on, hop-off bus tour. We walked by a bus sitting idle, and the female bus driver was very friendly and told us about all the benefits of the tour. She told us that not only was the tour flexible with timing (the ticket was good for 24 hours, but that was not strictly enforced), but we could get discounts on other tours that we would take, like Guinness and Jameson. So we decided that we would start the tour around noon.

We headed back to the hotel hoping that our room would be ready. We were both so exhausted - Kevin only slept a little bit on the plane, and I didn't sleep at all. Unfortunately, our room wasn't ready, so we sat in the lobby of the hotel. After about an hour, our room was finally ready, so we went to our room to take a nap. Actually, I think we both passed out.

When we woke up, we headed out to the tour bus. We decided that the two main things we wanted to see was the Guinness Brewery and he Jameson Distillery. Since we could do the bus tour over two days, we did Guinness on the first day, and Jameson on the second day. The Guinness Brewery is a self guided tour, in which you go through displays and some short videos while moving up several stories in the building. When we were almost at the top, there was a station there in which someone from the Brewery shows you how to pour the Perfect Pint. Kevin poured the perfect pint and then received a certificate stating so. From there we went up to the very top floor which has a 360 view of Dublin. Kevin took a few photos, and we both sat for awhile enjoying our Guinness Draughts.

After Guinness, we got back on the bus and rode it through Phonenix Park, the largest park - you can fit Central Park in it 2.5 times. It was late in the day and the park was really crowded, especially since it was a bank holiday. It appears that it was the first day of nice weather that Dublin had had in a long long time.