Ireland day 1

We arrive in Dublin via a redeye flight from Phily. Flight is uneventful, but we get very little sleep. Taxi to our AirBnB but can't get in. Our host owns the restaurant next door, so we wait around until someone is there for us to make sad puppydog eyes at. Our host isn't there yet but they do give us a place to leave our bags, so we do and go find some badly needed brunch. Once fed rather than wait around we go on a bus tour to get ourselves oriented and at least get a peek at Dublin's sights. And the bus stops at the Teeling Whiskey Distillery - that sounds like a fine stop, we take the tour and enjoy the tastings of some mighty fine whiskey. Rejoining the bus tour we make it back to our flat and yay there is a host to kindly let us in. We run back out just to pick up some groceries and have a quiet dinner at the flat and then collapse.

Map of our trip: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1n2v6c8ZEF3xPuuzPyGXtRWjFK9U&usp=sharing

Photos (probably only viewable by those friended with me on FB) at
https://www.facebook.com/karl.musser/posts/10155484461902247

Ireland day 2

Yay sleep. Ok, our first non-sleep deprived day in Ireland. First up is Trinity College, occupying the center of Dublin since 1592, we get a student led tour of the lovely campus - and it's "frosher's week", so the main square is filled with student clubs making their pitches at the incoming Freshmen. The highlight is their library which is gorgeous (pic), it is also the home of the harp that is the national symbol of Ireland, and the Book of Kells, reputed to be one of the most beautiful books ever created. Images from the book are available online, but don't really convey how vibrant and detailed the illustrations are - you really do need a microscope to see the detail.

From there we go The Immigration Museum, passing a memorial to victims of the great famine on the way. The museum is pretty cool, mostly a celebration of Irish culture and documenting the Irish diaspora. And right outside the museum is Oktoberfest! just in time for lunch. After lunch we make the obligatory trip to the shrine of Guinness, a cool tour/museum there and lovely views of the city from the top of their visitor center, but very much a tourist trap - I think my favorite part was the vintage advertising displays. For the evening we have a very tasty sushi dinner at our host's restaurant, a brief wander though the Temple Bar district, and then ending our evening in a quiet neighborhood pub not in the Temple Bar, enjoying a bit of session music and shooting the bull with the local characters.

Photos: https://www.facebook.com/karl.musser/media_set?set=a.10155484566027247.534887246&type=3

Ireland day 3

Sorry Dublin, 2 days is all you get, we've got places to go. In the morning we Uber back over to the airport to pick up our rental car and then it's off, driving a stick, on the left, it always takes a bit getting used to, but it's mostly highway driving for the morning which is pretty easy. For a mid-day break we stop at the National Stud, a thoroughbred horse breeding farm owned by the Irish government and also the site of a lovely Japanese garden. We do the tour and also lunch, amused by the fairy doors everywhere. The rest of the day is a long and rainy drive to Kinsale, but we eventually make it to our B&B. There we are greeted by the Irish grandmother we didn't know we had. We do a little walk along the harbor front and a tasty dinner of fish & chips, but are still pretty beat and turn in early.

Photos, mostly of the Japanese garden: https://www.facebook.com/karl.musser/media_set?set=a.10155484769112247.534887246&type=3

Ireland day 4

We start off with a ridiculously large breakfast spread - my first of many "Irish breakfast"s. Thus fortified we go on a most excellent guided walking tour of the town. Today Kinsale is a small coastal tourist town, that is foodie heaven, seriously I think this place has more restaurants per capita than seems feasable. It was also the primary port of sourthern Ireland for most of the middle ages through the renaissance, and the scene of the final major battle in the English conquest of Ireland. More recently it is also the closest town to where the Lusitania was sunk in WWI. After the tour we visit two mini-museums in town, one about the Lusitania, and one in a ruined castle about the wine industry (Ireland doesn't really make wine, but they did play a big role in shipping it, often serving as a transfer point between England and France and Spain). The castle also held American POWs during the revolutionary war. We have lunch at the White Houe, and I have one of the best seafood chowders I've ever had.

For the afternoon we go on a hike around Kinsale's bay to vist Charles Fort, a star fort similar in design to the several that we have along the east coast - the hike and the fort itself give some lovely views of the bay and looking out towards the ocean. The walk is a long, but fortunately there is a strategically placed pub available for weary hikers, we attempt to have a small snack, but end up feasting before making the trek back to town. In the evening we go out to a pub recommended to us for their music and they did not disappoint. By virtue of being from Chicago I was dragged on stage to help sing "City of Chicago" (which fortunately I knew). Music sample.

Photos: https://www.facebook.com/karl.musser/media_set?set=a.10155485023672247.534887246&type=3