Stepping Out: My Inevitable Last Stop

When booking my flight over here a couple of weeks before leaving the US, on a whim it hit me that instead of flying both in and out of Madrid, I might as well fly home from a different place so I could see somewhere different. Considering my perameters of both a place I hadn’t been before as well as a place I could get a cheap flight to from Brussels, I came up with Dublin. And here I am.

I only gave myself 2 days here so, as usual, I had a lot to do in a short time. A time made even shorter by the 2-hour nap I absolutely HAD to take yesterday morning after arriving (need I repeat: 6:30 am flights are never, NEVER!, a good idea). As usual, I had no plans upon arrival of what I wanted to do so figured I would work it out as I went. The one exception was making sure I went to the Guiness Storehouse to see where all the magic happens (not surprisingly, it is the #1 tourist destination in Dublin). And since I was pretty wiped out (read: not enough energy to do my usual city tour by foot) and it was cold and damp when I got here yesterday (read: I didn’t want to be outside) it seemed like the perfect day to do it.

I’ve gotten pretty good and fearless at getting myself around strange cities and countries, even when I don’t speak the language. That being said, the one mode of transportation I try to avoid at all costs in a place where I’m not familiar is the public bus. Oy. It can be challenging enough when you’re in a country where you DO speak the language as, if you’re not familiar with the bus system, it can be tricky knowing where to get off (ask me about the time in London when I overshot my stop by at least a half hour before I eventually caught on that something was up. Or the time in Santiago when I sailed right past the academy I was going to and had to majorly backtrack and showed up super late to class. Or the time in France when I was trying to get to the airport to catch a flight and I suddenly realized I was hurtling through the French countryside completely alone on the whole train, with NO other passengers and it was really and truly just me and the conductor on the train, him being sealed off in his car in the front and me pounding on it with all my might to alert him of my presence (yes, that was a train and not a bus, but still a good story!).

I appreciated their honesty: "Probably" the best pizza in town.
Not the best in the world, not even 100% sure that someone
else in town isn't better, but we think it's not likely....

Either way, as I was way too tired to try to make the long walk to the Guiness Factory like I would have normally done, I decided to give it a shot and brave the dreaded public bus system. Since I was now in an English-speaking country again, I felt my chances were a lot higher. In my brief experience here, it seems to me that the Irish are an extremely affable people (My first conversation here was with a guy at the airport who greeted me with a huge smile and a “Good morning! How are you today?” I answered with the typical American “Fine, thanks.” Only to have him come back with an even bigger smile and a “No, really, how ARE you??”. His enthusiasm was catching) and the bus driver was no exception. I asked how I would know when to get off and he assured me he would make a special announcement just for me when we got to that stop (hard to imagine a bus driver in Philly doing that. They’re generally more likely to chuck you off without a second thought for even daring to ask a question).

Dublin Castle

The driver kept his word and I got off at the right place w/o incident. I wasn't 10 steps away from the bus when yet another affable chap asked me if I had yet figured out how to get to the Guinness Factory (hmm, how did he just know I was going there? I apparently SCREAM tourist… have to work on that) and could we figure it out together? The funny thing about traveling alone is that you rarely end up traveling alone, which is awesome. So I ended up with a buddy to do the tour with and to share our free pints of freshly brewed and expertly poured Irish Guinness with, in the all-glass room at the top of the building that offered great views of the whole city. We toured, we talked, we laughed, we discussed politics and life and travel, we drank beer and spent an all-around great afternoon hanging out.

I like that in Ireland the churches and the
liquor companies can work together

Today I was back on track and up for my typical 8-hour city walking tour. I made it to the Dublin Castle (although I’m pretty sure I missed something there as it mostly looked like offices to me), to the original St. Patrick’s Cathedral, a bunch of other old buildings and churches, the very famous Trinity College and to the one place everyone told me I just HAD to get to in Dublin: the Temple Bar District.

The real deal, the ORIGINAL St. Patrick's Cathedral

Of course Ireland has a reputation for its pubs and, while you really do find just as many of them on every street and alley all over the city as you would imagine, Temple Bar District has a very high concentration of them in one area. Charming Irish pub after charming Irish pub for streets and streets. And the most famous of all of them is, you guessed it, Temple Bar. I decided there would be no more truly authentic way to spend a few hours in Dublin than to pass them in the most famous pub in the whole city, which I promptly did. The truth is, I’m not really a bar person; I’ve oftentimes found them to be seedy and even more often depressing. But British pubs are none of these things, they’re lively places filled with happy people and live music (at least in my limited experience); here they’re just such an intrinsic part of the culture, a place where friends meet, where families go for dinner (even with children) and where good times seem to abound. For a non-bar person, it was a great bar experience!

Just some random coolness I happened upon

Back to the hotel to pack up for the last time (whew!) and then off to the local pub that’s next to my hotel for dinner for a typical Irish dinner. A good friend of mine who travels for a living has obscene amounts of flight upgrades at his disposal and he very generously shares them with me whenever possible. Tomorrow is one of those times, so I’ll be heading back to the States in high style… wahoo! So while I’m not ready to leave and would happily stay another 3 weeks, the inevitable bummer of finally having to head back will be made that much easier by getting to do so in luxury. Aaaah.