A short time in Dublin

Dublin is a relatively small city and is sized such that it has a small tram system and buses as transport options but I felt I could walk around more simply, most of the time. I bought a 2 day city bus sightseeing tour which meant I could use it to go around - something that I had never done before.

Being heavily influenced by the independence from "England" and there are many parts of the city that are directly referencing it from the statues of the leaders to the names of the streets and buildings.

One of the sightseeing stops was to Kilmainham Gaol which is where a number of revolutionaries were kept captive by the British and also killed. It was here that the leaders of the Easter Rising of 1916 were executed and so I thought it was worth a visit and tour. The tour was very interesting (although slightly curtailed as one wing was being redeveloped) and well run. The Easter Rising captives were the main subjects but the jail itself was interesting as a building and as point in history. It was built as modern jail and prison records show the effects of the potato famine too with the numbers of children incarcerated for the theft of food - it is thought likely that many were happy to be caught so that they would get some food.

The size of Dublin makes it pleasantly walkable but I did fancy a change of scenery for that walk which took me, via recommendation to Howth. Howth is a suburb of Dublin but it feels so far away that it does not seem connected at all. In fact, as I walked around, you could look back on Dublin (or my image of Dublin). The reason for going to Howth is that it is an old fishing village with great scenery and looking out to sea, it was astonishing. The weather in Ireland is changeable - what many call "British weather" - and this meant that within the few hours I was there, I saw a lot of astonishing cloud movement. I was also able to look down on Dublin's port area and it was quite amazing to see a storm passing over.

There were lots of relatively interesting things about Dublin but not a huge amount stood out. I enjoyed it but I did find that the pubs that I saw were like Irish theme pubs - this may have been due to being in Dublin but I am not sure I'd enjoy that for very long

Ireland 2015 - click for photo album