Journey Mama: Ireland Day 1

Here's attempt 423847234 to post this blog to my travel blog...oh well...I shall simply post here. :)

We drove 2 hours to Frankfurt, got our tickets printed and headed to Passport and security with two duffel bags, camera bag, and a laptop bag. I was not about to pay 30 euros for checked baggage. I actually measured our bags to make sure they would not have to check them in. It was borderline rape through security, but we survived and made our flight on time. We arrived in Dublin at noon. A little overcast but no rain! Actually we had wonderful weather the whole week till the last day, we had a little rain and grey skies. But hey, we had to have some real Ireland weather at least once to feel Irish huh?

Next task was to find our rental car. Isn’t it cute? Only downside was that my husband drove it like a go-cart and I was a queezy passenger.

We didn’t have to check into our Bed and Breakfast till 2pm, so we headed into Downtown Dublin. It was like NYC!!! Never dawned on us to maybe park at the DART train and save our $$$ and marriage! We paid 4 euro an hour to park. We parked on the Quay…this old canal that ran through the city and divided the north from the south side of Dublin. Supposedly if you live on the north side you live in the Ghetto…all the rich and famous past and present live on the south side.

We had a list of things to see in Dublin…one of them was the Half Penny Bridge or as the Irish call it the Ha’ Penny Bridge. It is called the Halfpenny bridge because people used to pay half a penny to cross the bridge. It was originally called the Wellington Bridge named after the Duke of Wellington and then was officially named the Liffey Bridge. It was built in 1816. It is the most famous bridge in Ireland. “There was a ferry from the Bagnio Slip (at the bottom of Fownes Street) operated by one William Walsh. He owned seven leaky ferries and was under pressure from Dublin Corporation to repair them or replace them. He baulked at that idea, preferring instead to build a bridge. His proposal to Dublin Corporation was adopted and he was allowed in a hundred year lease to charge a halfpenny toll.” Folks paid this toll fee till 1919. The bridge is also located near the Temple Bar Square.

This is the Four Courts building built in 1786. It houses the Supreme court and the High court of Ireland. This building was severely damaged in 1922 during the Civil War and because a lot of public documents were destroyed, it is hard for the dubliners to trace their relatives before 1900.

We frequently heard local Irish singers while strolling around Dublin. This Irishman was also selling art.

Headed downtown to Temple Bar Square to eat lunch…

This is a photo of the inside…I did not take this photo.

I ordered Irish sausage on mashed potatoes and cabbage…it was really good!

Spotted several kids walking home from different schools. All the girls where these plaid skirts and the boys were grey or blue dress pants, shirts and ties!

We checked into our B&B at Evergreen B&B in Malahide, Ireland. Olive is a fantastic hostess. She’s been running her B&B for 15 years. We were greeted with a lovely Irish accent,scones and hot tea. She made us feel special and treated us like first rate guests. Always trying to draw us maps to get us around even though we kindly reminded her we did bring our GPS. :)

This is a full Irish breakfast. :)

Part of the breakfast room/sunroom.

After dropping off our things we headed out to find a café and some sights as the afternoon was still young!

We found this church, St. Dolough…I thought it was so beautiful…and so preserved. I love the cemetary too with all the Celtic crosses, This church was dedicated to a saint, St Dolough, whose feast in Nov. 17. This church dates back centures ago depicting the roof tops of saxon churches. St. Dolough was a patron of the church Sloghran Swords.