A weekend trip to Ireland

This weekend, I took a quick trip w/ the parents to Ireland. We arrived in Dublin on Saturday mid-day. We had lunch at Bewley's on Grafton Street which I loved! Then, we did the Book of Kells at Trinity College and that was pretty sweet. It's a 9th century Celtic version of the gospel and it's amazing!!! No pics allowed, but I stared at it for quite some time just admiring the writing, drawings, calligraphy. Amazing stuff. There was also a sweet long room of books. Good stuff.

Then, we did the hop-on/hop-off tour and saw the city. We stopped at the Guinness Storehouse and did the tour, mainly because I'm fascinated by the sweet statistics that was developed here. I'm not a huge Guinness fan, but the views from the top were quite amazing.

Polo game in the park!

Love this harp bridge

U2 Graffiti Wall

Then, we had dinner at Gallagher's Boxty House. AMAZING! So many amazing uses of potato. And good stews.

Saturday was a bus tour to Northern Ireland. In Belfast you could either see the Titanic exhibit or take a black taxi tour and learn about the political unrest in the city. I chose Titanic because I was tired of sitting in a vehicle and that was maybe not the best decision as dad said the taxi tour was pretty sweet, but it was still fun. The Titanic was built in Belfast, so that was the focus of the exhibit and it was a nicely done museum with lots of interactive things including a little ride through the shipyard.

Then, we headed to Giant's Causeway which is a pretty cool rock formation on the coast. I've never seen anything like it, so it was certainly impressive. My parents say the ones in the US (Devil's Pile or something) or more impressive.

After the Causeway, it was off to Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge. This was fun. And, you after you went across you had great views of Scotland off in the distance. Again, love the coast line and being near the water. Great stuff.

Monday was supposed to be a tour to Newgrange (Ireland's answer to Stonehenge), but the tour company was 20 minutes late and super sketchy about when we'd return, and I didn't want to miss my flight, so we skipped the tour. But, this allowed me to do my long run in Dublin and so I did 7 miles along the canal and over to the coastline. Again...loved it! I love running along the coast!!

After my run, we had a very nice lunch at The Bank restaurant. Then, it was off to the General Post Office (a neat building with lots of history and a replica of the Book of Kells), the Famine Statue, and St. Stephen's Green.

I really loved the countryside of Ireland and would love to see more of that. Dublin was just okay. It's no London. :) So, next time....more countryside. Less city.