Dublin

Published by Vikki Paterson on 24/04/2022

Friday 22nd April – Sunday 24th April

Day 1

Our Irish adventure started with Vikki feeling a little tired, due to landing from Jamaica and being on English soil for less than 12 hours before we flew out again!

Very quick and easy check in and through security and decided to have some food, despite the most enormous queue we got served quickly. Short flight which Vikki slept most of and Steve got a bit of a wash from his exploding water bottle!

A short wait for a taxi after landing and we were on our way to the hotel…with a taxi driver who insisted on humming along to very irritating music! Hotel was very nice and we were delighted to find we had our standard room with a car park view (certainly seems to be a constant theme!).

We went to the Bleeding Horse pub next door to the hotel (at the recommendation of reception) for Steve to get an obligatory pint of Guiness. It was heaving and pretty noisy but we had a couple of drinks before heading back to the hotel bar. Steve wasn’t too impressed with the Guiness and it didn’t even combine a proper Guiness glass!

Finishing off the evening with a drink in the hotel bar and Steve decided to throw his pint all over himself, the table and floor.

Day 2

A good night’s sleep in a comfy bed and we started the morning with a luke warm coffee from the machine in the room and once Steve eventually found his missing socks we had a nice breakfast (apart from the anti-vaxer ranting at the next table!).

All set and ready for the day when Steve realised he’d lost his gillet, which turned up at the pub. We headed off for a day touring Dublin via The Big Bus hop on hop off service. We headed for the bus stop through a lovely park with amazing flowers but it meant we just missed the bus. After getting rather complicated directions we made a dash to a different stop. After failing miserably to get to that stop we stumbled upon another one and eventually got on the bus!

The open top bus was a great idea, however it was rather windy and a bit chilly!

Dublin castle was interesting and very nice to look round, Steve managed to get all our stuff locked in a locker so after the staff overrode the combination we then went on a rather long walk to get a Five Guys for lunch (seeing plenty of scaffolding and touring quite a few car parks, love a car park!)

After lunch we headed for the Guiness Storehouse but as we hadn’t booked din advance we couldn’t get in so we ran round to beat the bus to the next stop…feeling really cocky that we beat the bus, only for the bus not to stop!

Finally back on the bus and the tour continued and we got off at the Nancy Hand pub where we could get a free Guinness with our bus ticket. Safe to say Vikki does not like Guiness!

A beer and a wine later and we headed to Phoenix Park where, much to Steve’s disgust, we hired a tandem bike and not electric bikes!

The ride was VERY windy, we sae lots of deer and got a numb bum but it was actually a lot of fun. Unfortunately we had a long wait for the bus at the end of it which we took to the stop closest to the direction of the Arena.

A long walk parallel with the river and we got to the Arena for the Alan Partridge show. Unfortunately there was no where for dinner so Steve had a manky hotdog and Vikki had salty popcorn for tea and there was no IPA so for the second time in one day Steve didn’t finish a beer!

We had brilliant seats, although Steve did have a rather large guy to his left who did eventually budge up to the empty seat next to him (after a little prompting during the interval!).

We got the Luau tram back towards the city centre and then walked to the hotel, as we were walking up a pedestrianised street we saw a couple of men running and a police car giving chase!

We couldn’t find anywhere to get food so had a few drinks at the hotel bar, they wouldn’t serve us food in the bar but said they’d do room service so after a few drinks we took one to the room and had chicken sandwich, crisps and wine in bed at 2am!

Day 3

A very long and busy day with a late night meant for a very late and sleepy start to the day. Breakfast was busy but nice and the coffee was a bit warmer and better (or maybe we just needed it more!).

We had a wander through St Stephen’s park, visited the Little Museum which was really interesting and entertaining – even Vikki had to admit it was good. We then had burritos for lunch, followed by coffee lying in the sun for an hour before finishing up with an ice cream before heading to the airport.