Our last few days in Ireland have been easy touring on the Big Red hop-on hop-off Bus. Galleries and museums, Trinity College, etc - we’re a bit toured out! The best tour was the Discover Dublin boat tour; our guide Ronan was fantastic. He gave us a running commentary on the history of not only Dublin but also the river Liffey and port of Dublin.
So much I didn’t know. I must have studied it at school but obviously I wasn’t paying attention 😏. The Vikings! They were a busy lot back in the day. We learnt (among a lot of other things!) that it was the Vikings who established Dublin way back in the C8th. The first Viking Age in Ireland (there was another it seems in C10th after many hostilities) began at the end of the C8th when Vikings began carrying out hit-and-run raids on Irish coastal settlements; they were everywhere! Over the following decades the clever Vikings built naval encampments in Ireland to allow them to remain there throughout the winter - we found something akin to this on the Isle of Skye where they had dug channels inland to haul their boats to ‘dry’ land or inland lochs. Within 50 odd years they had founded a stronghold at what was to become Dublin. The Danes ruled Ireland for some time (not sure how long) and during long periods of bloody fighting. But here we are today firmly on Irish soil ruled by the Irish!
What with the Vikings then the Normans then the English, what a history the Irish have! No wonder they are a rebellious lot.
There’s a rich history of rebels and freedom fighters and they are honoured with street and building names. Daniel O’Connell, the Liberator, is still revered. In the early 1800s he campaigned vigorously for Catholic emancipation and generally to improve the lot of Irish Catholics in what was essentially a Protestant country ruled by England. Today the large statue of him at the end of O’Connell St sports a few bullet holes from the 1916 Easter uprising, but the city wears them proudly.
Such a place! What a journey! Tomorrow we board a plane for home.
Daniel O’Connell himself.
Great little footbridge over the river running beside Bachelors Walk. No don’t look at Lindsay!
A replica of the Jeannie Johnston one of the many famine boats to take people from starving Ireland to the ‘new world’. She never lost a passenger but so many poor starving people died on most ships that they were called ‘coffin’ ships.
The Samuel Beckett bridge which can swing open 90 degrees from its one pylon. Amazing structure.
The Ha’Penny bridge so called because when it was built in the early 1800s people were charged a Ha’penny to cross it.
Gorgeous front to the Merchants Archway through to Temple Barr
Temple Bar is a colourful place. It has a bit of every and is a popular place to eat or take in the nightlife
Temple Bar is a colourful place. It has a bit of every and is a popular place to eat or take in the nightlife
The Dawson Lounge is the smallest pub in Ireland- it seats 12 people.
St Patrick’s cathedral. Strangely there are no catholic cathedrals in Dublin, including this one!
The house where Mr Guinness lived with his family - wife and 21 children! Boy that Guinness must be good stuff.
In Temple Bar there are a number of lanes dedicated to a range of the arts. My favourite was that dedicated to Irish women writers including the wonderful tragic Iris Murdoch.
Library Square at Trinity.
Fascinating sculpture outside one of the libraries. This piece known locally as ‘Pomodoro sphere’ (Pomodoro was the artist) is entitled ‘Sfera con Sfera’. I’ll leave you to look more closely.
Glasnevin Cemetery. The round tower in the centre stands over the tomb of Daniel O'Connell. He was instrumental in bringing about changes so that Catholics could be buried in cemeteries with protestants.
Oops a bit out of sequence but .... The public could only go as far as the staircase in the museum but there were great little exhibits and these magnificent Irish marble pillars.
Intricate filigree work outside the Museum at Trinity.
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