A Day in Dublin

We started out our day with a bus tour of Dublin. Even though we did one the last time we were here, it is always interesting to see what new things are happening. 

Christ Church is the oldest church in Dublin and was founded in 1030. It is located in the center of Dublin.

Dublin is becoming Europe's Silicone Valley. Currently the European headquarters of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Air Bnb, and Google are all within a 4 block area of Dublin. In fact currently Google is building 3 additional high rises in the area and will be expanding its already 8,000 person workforce.

Dublin seems to have a pub on every corner!

The city also has many beautiful flowers!

 The old homes are surrounded by ivy and currently house many hotels, restaurants, and businesses.

St. Patrick's Cathedral is the second oldest church in Dublin. It was founded in 1191 and is the central church to the Church of Ireland.

The Ha'penny Bridge was built in 1816 and until that year there was a ferry to move passengers from one side of the river to the other. The owner was told he had to either fix the ferries or build a bridge as the ferries were in bad shape, so he chose to build a bridge. However, for the first 100 years he charged everyone ha'penny to cross.

After our bus tour we headed off for our evening excursion which was an Irish music pub crawl. 

We started off in the famous Temple Bar area.

Our first pub was Oliver St. John Gogarty.  We met our two guides Alan (who was the guitar player and singer) and Eamon (who played the flute and drum).

Then we headed to the Ha'Penny Bridge Pub which is one of only two family run pubs left in the Temple Bar area. Upstairs we listened some more to our musicians. 

They were fantastic and it was real traditional Irish music. They told us the history of every song and it was truly inspirational and interesting. 

Learning about the history of the music made me appreciate it that much more. It was a great way to spend one of our last nights.