Dublin

We started the day with breakfast in the cabin and then got ready to have a look at Dublin.  It seemed that most of the ship was doing the same excursion as us.  The sun was shining and some Irish dancers were strutting their Riverdance type stuff as we got off the ship.  Our Irish guide, James, welcomed us on to the bus and we were on our way.  It was just a 5 minute drive into the city via the harp style bridge.

We headed to our first stop – St Patrick’s Cathedral which, surprisingly, thanks to Henry VIII, is Anglican.  However, as only 10% of the population is Anglican, the services tend to be ‘open’ Christian, so all are welcome.  Jonathan Swift of Gulliver’s Travel fame was once Dean of St Patrick’s and he is buried there along with one of his young partners.

We then moved on to Trinity College – a truly magnificent set of buildings and the setting for some of the outdoor shots of Educating Rita. We decided not to visit the Book of Kells which is housed here but instead went on the search of Molly Malone and a Starbucks.  We found Mollie but, despite visiting 4 Starbucks establishments, could not get a Dublin mug.

We decided not to bother with a glass of Guinness since neither of us likes the stuff so we returned to the ship for a pizza/pasta lunch and a rest.