Day 59 Dublin, Ireland

Day 59 Dublin, Ireland

Blue skies, white puffy clouds, castles, stately homes, suffering….

We arrived early this morning on the incoming tide and the intention is to leave this afternoon on the outgoing tide. We heard 4 passports were handed over to port authorities in Greenock just before we sailed yesterday. A road accident caused 2 Princess Tour Buses to arrive an hour late into Port.  Hmmm….

Six of us hired a taxi for 4 1/2  hours @ Euro 50 an hour. We were taken out to Wicklow to see Powerscourt Gardens. The 47 acres of landscaped gardens and 13^th century castle which was converted extensively during 1731 to 1741 by the Slazenger family. They are considered by some to be the prettiest gardens in Ireland and as I haven't seen any other at this stage, I am impressed and can see why.

The gardens consist of a walled garden, several different ponds and fountains, a huge lake, pet cemetery, Italian Garden and a Japanese Garden. A lot of the statues and fountains were bought from Versailles, Milan, Paris and Bavaria. 

Today's weather was perfect for our morning walk around the gardens; I believe we are very fortunate to be in Ireland on such a lovely day. We were the first to arrive there, so by the time we left, two tour buses had just arrived and another was coming through the gates as we left. Yahoo what a win.

The taxi driver drove us into Dublin, showing us the Georgian apartments which housed the English over 100 years ago. The individual front doors are now proudly decorated in bright colours. The places of interest we visited in Dublin were Trinity College, Dublin Castle, Guinness Brewery and St Patrick's Cathedral. We walked around Trinity College and thought of seeing the Kell Book but there was a long queue to get in. The Guinness Brewery had 5 huge tourist buses parked outside, so we decided not to join the many cruise passengers doing the tour. Next stop was to the cathedral but the charge into see it put us off. ABC. We walked around Dublin Castle and its medieval record Tower and into the Chapel Royal. To top off a great day in Dublin we ended with a stop at one of their department stores which just happened to have 50% off Waterford Crystal!