Today was to be a more leisurely day than Saturday, but still very productive in our sight seeing. We started off by going to St. Patrick's Cathedral. I had read many impressive things about the Cathedral and was looking forward to taking a peek inside.
The exterior of St. Patrick's Cathedral:
The nave and memorials were all very impressive, but I still think Christ Church Cathedral was nicer. The best thing about St. Patrick's Cathedral was all of the old Irish Regiment flags and armour inside the Cathedral. There is one whole area filled with the military flags and helmets, swords, and more flags line the Choir.
Some of the many military flags of the Irish Regiment:
Looking down the choir and nave:
The choir with it's flags, helmets, and swords:
St. Patrick's Cathedral seemed to have become more touristy, as we found out close to the end of our visit when 3 tour buses of people arrived inside of the Cathedral. Oh well. At the end of walking around the Cathedral we were able to see the graves of Jonathan Swift and his inspiration, Stella. There were also many memorials to them as well inside the Cathedral.
The graves of Jonathan Swift & Stella:
Next, it was off to the Kilmainham Gaol (pronounced jail), which is a very famous prison in Dublin, it even housed many of the Invincibles and Civil War prisoners. The old part of the gaol was built in 1789 and walking through the very old, dingy halls was a very surreal experience.
One of the original wings of the gaol built in 1789:
The door of Thomas Clarke, the last prisoner of Kilmainham Gaol:
The east wing was much more impressive, it was a Victorian style prison, with 3 levels of cells and much more open, so the guards could see all around them. It was also built with great acoustics so if any prisoner made a sound the guards could immediately hear it. The acoustics are so great that even U2 and Sinead O'Connor have recorded there. The move Michael Collins was also filmed there, since this is the prison that Michael Collins was actually kept at.
The east wing of Kilmainham Gaol:
Tami & Greg inside the East Wing of Kilmainham Gaol:
Greg inside one of the east wing cells:
The gaol closed in the 1920's and was left abandoned until some volunteers came in to restore it in the 1960's, at which point in the 70's it was opened up for tourists to visit. Towards the end of our visit we went outside to the stone breakers yard, where not only were stones broken but several were executed. Public hangings used to occur over the front doors of the gaol but it was finally deemed illegal to have public hangings so they were moved out to the grounds. Then firing squads also started taking place of the hangings for executions.
The window over the front door where public hangings took place (the white squares at the top of the window is where the hanging apparatus was attached):
We heard many amazing stories about people that stayed in the prison, and I was fascinated by them. One of the leaders of the 1916 rebellion, Joseph Plunkett, was able to get married to his long time girlfriend, Grace Gifford, the day before his execution. They only got to see each other for about 2 minutes after their marriage, then he was immediately taken outside and executed. She later became a prisoner herself in the east wing.
This plaque represents the execution spot of the leaders of the 1916 rebellion:
Grace Gifford (Mrs. Joseph Plunkett) drew this in her cell while imprisoned at Kilmainham:
Another story was about James Connolly, another leader of the 1916 rebellion. He was actually on his death bed when it was time for his execution. He was so sick that he was in the hospital, and not the gaol, so they brought him in an ambulance to the back yard, took him from his gurney and placed him in a chair to execute him, rather than letting him die of natural causes in the next few days. We listed to stories like this for hours.
The cross is where James Connolly's chair was for his execution:
We decided it was time for lunch, so we headed to Murray's Bar & Grill on O'Connell Street where Greg enjoyed Irish Stew with his Guinness and I had roasted chicken with mashed potatoes and way too many veggies for me. It was good but still didn't hold a candle to the food from the Guinness Storehouse. We walked down O'Connell Street to go to Clery's, where a great tea room is supposed to be, but it was closed. Oh well. We continued walking down Henry Street, known as the poor man's Grafton Street (ok, maybe more middle class than poor) towards the Millennium Bridge. We again walked through the Temple Bar area and down to the National Museum of Ireland.
We had read that they had a Viking Exhibit going on and it was free, so sounded like a great plan to us. We wanted to take a seat for a few minutes first so we had some tea in the cafe before starting on the exhibit itself. The Viking exhibit was great, but we wished there was more to it. We hadn't expected to see actual remains of vikings, so that took us a bit by surprised, but seeing the actual artifacts and jewelry and stuff was good. When we were done with the museum we decided to stop in at a pub we had seen on the way over, The Blarney Inn. They advertised that they had Beamish Red, and since this was Greg's nemesis from Cork, we thought we had to see if they actually had any. Low and behold, they did, so Greg finally got to taste his Beamish Red, and he enjoyed it.
Now it was time to enjoy the pubs of Temple Bar, since that is one thing that Dublin is famous for. Of course we started at The Temple Bar, the most famous of the pubs. We had some beer plus Greg had a whiskey while we listed to the live band playing. The place was packed and full of life and atmosphere, it was great.
The Temple Bar:
Greg outside the Temple Bar:
We also tried to go to another pub but they were playing very loud music and the group there was very obnoxious and moshing around, so we decided not to stay. We ended up going to Gallaghers for our dinner reservations a bit early. Gallaghers is known for their Irish boxty's and we were looking forward to having one. I had eaten a big lunch and wasn't real hungry so I was glad to see that they had a side of boxty pancakes rather than a full portion. Well, when I ordered the waiter informed me that during the dinner hours you have to order an actual dinner, you cannot just order off the side menu, I was absolutely shocked. Surprisingly, I started to cry, don't know why but it really caught me off guard. I didn't really want a full dinner and didn't feel like I should have to order something I was not going to eat, the waiter did not care, nor did any of the other staff, so we just left.
Tami outside of the Temple Bar area:
It actually turned out well, we went back to our room and enjoyed the cheese from Sheridan's that we had bought on Saturday. So, we ended up with a little picnic in our room to finish off a great trip to Dublin. Tomorrow was going to be another early start to head back to London for work, but it is always worth it.
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