Our plane touched down in Dublin around 6am, and we hopped on a bus (very easy) to get to O’Connell St. downtown, where we walked the few blocks to the Abbey Hotel. Lovely and bright, we admired the view for about thirty seconds, then we promptly collapsed in bed to recover the six hours of sleep we missed by travelling east all night.
Got up at 11am and started our exploration of Dublin. By law, all public signage is shown both in English and Irish (Gaelic). I'll be providing some Gaelic when I can. Walked to Trinity College, built in 1592, to see the Book of Kells, Ireland’s most famous illuminated manuscript of the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, in Latin, lavishly decorated in gold leaf and colored inks. Created in the 800s, they were sent to Trinity for safekeeping in 1661. I am awed and amazed by anything made by the hands of man that is that old, and has survived for such a long time. How did they manage to preserve it during all the wars and bombings Dublin has undergone in the last 1200 years? In the same Old Library is the Long Room, which contains over 200,000 of the library’s oldest works, running from floor to ceiling two stories high, with skinny ladders at intervals so that the books on the upper shelves can be reached. Imagine the research you could accomplish here!
In the museum on campus we came across the skeleton of a giant Irish Deer, which was as tall as an elephant. The college buildings are laid out around Parliament Square, where the students reclined and sat in groups, eating their lunches – how lucky to go to a school with so much history. Did the students in the 1600s eat their lunches here too?
In the afternoon we walked all around St. Stephen’s Green, a lovely park right in the middle of the city, with a waterfall, and a Victorian floral garden at its center, and a picturesque ivy-covered cottage at one end. Flowers are in bloom everywhere, and the noise of the city fades away. What a nice respite!
Tucked in the middle of a block of buildings is University Church, which we would have missed if we hadn’t been looking for it. Inside were a beautiful set of murals of vivid colors, with predominant blues, above a neo-Byzantine interior, with a Mary chapel off to one side. Close by is the Huguenot Cemetery, where the French who fled the persecution of Louis XIV are buried. The alliance between the French and the Irish recurs throughout Irish history.
We had our first lunch of real pub food in a larger pub nearby – homemade mushroom soup and toasted chicken sandwiches.
Stopped in at St. Ann’s Anglican Church (Church of Ireland) built in 1707, and had a nice chat with a friendly verger and the choir director, as he practiced for the next service. Above the choirmaster’s head was a shelf containing three loaves of bread, which he explained are the result of an endowment since 1723 to provide a daily supply of bread for the benefit of any poor person, who can come in and take a loaf as needed with no questions asked.
Although we saw a few homeless begging alms on the street, the overall feel of the city we saw today is busy, multi-cultural, working and fairly prosperous. The tourist area around Grafton St. is a pedestrian-only area with all kinds of shops and restaurants, street musicians, buskers, and flower stalls. Dinner was Indian buffet with lots of delicious dishes to sample, then we turned in early – I think we’ll sleep well tonight!
