Dublin

Saturday we drove down from our home in Omeath to the Dublin Airport where we dropped off our rented van to Irish Car Rental and said our sad good-byes. We put some 1500 kilometers on the odometer and it got us around this green island in style.

A 20 minute taxi ride into Dublin and we were situating ourselves into our B&B, which are prevalent here in Ireland. We found a nearby cafe which was delicious and then proceeded to buy tickets for the Hop On Hop Off bus which takes us around the major sites of Dublin. We took the whole circuit before getting off anywhere, which took a total of 90 minutes or so. Second time around we hopped off at the Dublin Castle which ended up being a bust since we would have to wait 45 minutes for the next tour and we heard that it wasn't really worth it. Getting back on the bus we found out that our next desired stop, Kilmainham Gail (jail), was already closed, seeing that the day was getting late. So instead my mom and I split up from the group to do our own thing. We ended up walking through Temple Bar area which is a pedestrian walk with tons of stores, restaurants and bars. We made our way across Half Penny bridge and over to Henry/Mary street, with more shops. We only had our rudimentary map given us from the bus company, and had an idea of where home was, but in this crazy city where streets names change every 5 blocks we didn't want to end up kilometers from home. So we bought these really cool maps and made our way home.

This morning we had a taxi pick us up and take us to the Finglas Ward which met at 11 am. My grandparents had a wonderful time chatting and visiting with members. Back from our taxi ride we ate lunch and then all headed off on our own. So my mom and I took off again and headed for Trinity College, where we toured the Book of Kells exhibit and the Old Library which was amazing.