Our bus arrived 20 minutes late and that was okay. Everyone on the group was super chill and nice about it. Once we got on the bus at 8:20 we met our tour guide (besides Tom, who was also there) James and he was my first ginger on the ginger count. The bus drove us around Dublin and he told us about history and between listening and counting the gingers on the street I had a good time. We stopped and got off the bus at St Patrick's cathedral.
There James threw more history at us and it was great. My only complaint about this trip is about how big our group is. We take up a lot of room. Thankfully, everyone is extremely passive and it was easy for me to get to where I wanted to be in terms of hearing James talk and looking at old church stuff.
St Patrick's cathedral was nice. They had a lot of books and statues of famous people's heads. There was an old door with a hole in the middle called The Door of Reconciliation. Story goes 2 families were fighting and the losing side's leader cut a hole in the door to shake hands with the other guy's leader. That's where the phrases "try your hand" and "chance your arm" come from. They shook hands and there was peace in Dublin. 2 days later, the families were back to fighting.
Door of Reconciliation
More history lessons followed. Dublin has kind of a comical history. Basically they rebel, lose, and rebel again over and over. Lots of fighting and lots of losing. Eventually we got back on the bus and drove to a park called Phoenix Park. We drove by a building built by the guy who built the White House. They looked similar. We drove on to the Pope's Cross, named so because a pope was there once and it's a cross.
Pope's Cross
We got off the bus and some of us ran up to the cross to stand there. It was cold and windy but ever so green.
I'm shivering.
We got back on the bus and drove to Trinity College. As the tour guide was telling us about Trinity, I thought of my Camin. He should go here, they could just pay him to be a scholar. AND it's legal to take your sword and armor to class. Very neat. I wish I had made Camin come to Ireland. I think I will bring him to Dublin sometime in the future.
Anyways, the point of going to college was to see the Book of Kells. The Book of Kells is a very old book aging around 1,000 years and made out of calf skin. It survived the attack of the vikings.
We were asked not to take pictures of the book so I didn't. The book was in a separate room from everything else and there was a line to view it. I half waited, half cut. I didn't spend too long a time looking at the Book of Kells. I went upstairs and there was a library. There were old books out on display, categorized by children's literature, mythology, bible, etc. I took pictures of stuff that reminded me of my Camin, or stuff that I thought would interest him.
Camin stuff
Then I left. Downstairs there was a gift shop. I'm not a fan of gift shops because I think it's overpriced tourists crap but the girls were into it so I waited for them. I found something nice to look at while I waited.
I love mirrors.
Once we were done at Trinity college, our group had the rest of the day for free time. Maria, Mia, Kaitlyn and I left to go to a brewery. Since Guinness is so beloved by Dubliners, breweries have a hard time staying alive in this city. The Porterhouse Brewing is the only micro brewery in Dublin that Guinness hasn't killed.
Stayin' alive.
We got a table and ordered food and drinks. I had a Porterhouse pale ale and a shot of Jameson to chase it with because I hate beer. I also ordered a pulled pork sandwich and chips.
Lunch.
More lunch.
We left the brewery around 2. Our tour guide Tom had told us about a museum where they had dead bodies that had been preserved in bog. He warned it was not for those with a weak stomach or faint heart. He sold me on dead bodies. We spent a while trying to find the museum. I don't do maps so it was up to the other three to find the way. We ended up walking past the museum and having to double back.
National Museum of Ireland
Admission was free. We split up two-and-two trying to find the bodies. Maria texted Mia and I when she found them and gave us directions. The room with the bog bodies had them behind walls I guess so people could read about them without having to lay eyes on them. They were pretty gross.
Cause of death: gingervitis
Each body had a story like how old the person was, what was their diet, how they likely died, etc. This guy below had his head cut off, along with his nipples.
Hold my hand.
Now that I look back on it, I'm not sure if we were allowed to take pictures. I took a lot to the point where I was worried about the amount of dead body photos on my iphone and if i should delete some for security reasons.
Give us a kiss!
Once we got our fill of gore, we split up again. Kaitlyn and I looked at Viking stuff upstairs. Again, I thought of my Camin and wished he was there. As much as I enjoy looking at old stuff, I know Camin would enjoy it 100 times more and I get sad that he isn't there too. It would have been way more exciting to have him there explaining what we were looking at it further detail and whether something I had been staring at for minutes was of any significance or not. I would just rather listen to him than read the item description.
Near every item there was a description of it in Gaelic and 8 out of 10 times there was a description in English too.
I would wear it.
I lost Kaitlyn in the viking section but found Maria. We wandered around more then went to the gift shop where we found the other two girls. The gift shop had a lot of toys and I had to play with some.
"You couldn't kill me if you tried for one hundred years."
Side note: my head is so effing big it barely fit inside this hat....
I got other people to play along too.
Imagine this coming at you in the battlefield.
It was fun. We left the museum and wandered around Dublin for hours going in and out of shops. It was really nice and relaxing. Dublin isn't intimidating at all. The people get in your way a lot, way more so than in New York and there's way more people there, but it's easy to get around on foot.
I have noticed how the other three girls are a wee bit skiddish. There was an older guy staggering around the street (afternoon drunk, bless him) yelling things at people he walked by. I hung around to see if he would yell at me and when he got closer I turned to laugh with the other girls at how silly this situation was. But they were no where to be seen! They had actually crossed the street and walked away from the yelling guy. I joined them and they were obviously really uncomfortable so I suggested we leave and they followed happily. Drunk guy never yelled at me, he ended up picking a verbal fight with some lad down the street.
We stopped for drinks around 6 at a colorful shop called Hippety. I had an earl grey tea, someone had a cappuccino and the other two got waters.
Tea time.
We hung out at the shop for over an hour playing on our phones and bullshitting with each other. At one point Maria thought that drunk guy walked by the window and she got jumpy but I didn't notice him. It was a fun time, the shop was cute (not cute enough for a picture apparently because I forgot to take one). My drink cost 2.70 euros.
But I'm cute enough for a picture.
We left to find dinner. Maria wanted to have dinner at a pub and Kaitlyn wanted to eat at a place with live music. With that in mind, we kept going in and out of restaurants and pubs trying to find the right one. While walking down an alley, some skinny ginger lady with sores on her lips got up in my face and was like "I'm sorry to bother you, but as you can see I'm 5 months pregnant-" and I cut her off with a firm "I don't have any money." and walked away from her. I think she freaked the other girls out because they kept asking about her. Then they talked shit about her.
We finally found a suitable restaurant called The Merchant's Arch that had a bar and a guy on guitar singing American jams. We were seated in the tiny little corner table next to some other people. They had one of our table's chairs and I asked if I could take it.
"No..." the lady said to me.
"Are you fucking kidding me?" I asked her. She didn't answer. Everyone was kinda surprised so Mia grabbed me a chair from a different table and I sat so close to the strangers table that no one could get by me. That lady was rude.
I had water and ordered a chicken stir fry for 13.95. It was good.
Dinner
The guy playing music wasn't my favorite. If I hadn't been paying attention to the lyrics I wouldn't have known what song he was playing, his guitar skills were kinda the same thing over and over. Also, our waitress sucked. She took forever getting our checks then screwed them up a bit.
We left The Merchant's Arch around 9 and walked back to the hotel. We crossed over the Ha'penny bridge, the only construction in Dublin I knew prior to the trip, and there were locks attached to the bridge. The locks are love locks. Couples attach a lock to symbolize their love and throw the key into the river. I had to write a paper on love locks once and how cities hate them because they're an eyesore and the weight of the locks causes damage to historic bridges.
I can't believe this vandalism.
We walked back to the hotel and even found someone from our group who was lost and also looking for the hotel. We took said person with us and the five of us got back to the hotel around 9:20. I typed up today's events and just like last night everyone was asleep and in bed before I got this posted. I went to sleep around 1:30.
I forgot to mention, yesterday at the Dublin airport I exchanged money. I withdrew 100 euros and it was very easy.
Ginger count: over 90! I hit 50 before we left Trinity College and started counting again after tea.
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