The flight over to Dublin was eventful enough, with Bel drawing a middle seat between me, and some rather large guy. As the "service" came through the cabin, this guy ordered himself a red wine, and then proceeded to knock it over, getting himself and Bel a little covered in red. Luckily it only got Bel a little on her jeans, but as he tried to clean up his splilage, he proceeded to knock the glass over twice more, and completely coat himself with red wine. Poor bastard.
In all that confusion, I ended up leaving a book on Ireland, that we had bought at the Frankfurt airport, on the plane. :(
Arriving at the airport, it was a good thing that we didn't just trust the map we had printed for getting to our hotel, but rather checked at the local tourist information desk. They proceeded to tell us that our hotel wasn't where it was shown on the map we had, but rather somewhere else, and which bus to take. So we piled into a double-decker public bus - which was chockers with ppl and luggage - and proceeded to the hotel, which was a comfortable bus trip from the airport, but also only a short bus trip from the center of Dublin.
As breakfast wasn't in our room rate, we headed into Dublin the next morning for breakfast in the Temple Bar area - an area along the river with a lot of pubs and restaurants. We ended up at the Bad Ass Cafe / Pizza Restaurant. Here I scoffed down the Big Ass Breakfast, which Bel managed the vegetarian version. The walls of this restaurant have the repeating theme of the donkey in various "Bad Ass" situations (dressed as Mafiosa etc...) which I found quite funny. Coffee was shit though.After breakfast we did the obligatory Hop-on-Hop-off bus tour of Dublin to orient ourselves, which would have been a lot nicer if it didn't rain on and off during the day - something that we would have to get used to over the next weeks. (Everyone keeps telling me that it was my own fault for going to Ireland...ever).
Our one disembarkment from the bus was to have a look at the Kilmainham Gaol. I would have taken a bunch of photos here, but eventhough I had the camera there, I neglected to put the battery back in after charging it... :(Anyway, this Gaol is famous for many reasons, including being the place of the imprisonment and execution of the leaders of the Easter Rising, and also being used for many films including "In the name of the father", "Michael Collins", and "The Italian Job". This was also where we learned that the Irish Flag was based on the French national flag, with the Green representing the historical Gaelic Culture or Catholics, the Orange for supporters of William the Orange or Protestants, and the white symbolising pease between the two cultures.
Another interesting part of the history here is, that during the famine years, people were actually committing crimes deliberatley in order to get in here, because they at least were guaranteed to get fed. There were complaints that the people in the gaol were getting too well fed, so the warden went on to reduce their rations, also in an attempt to stop people committing crimes in an attempt to get in. This gaol was also where a number of people were held before being sent to Australia. :)
Over the next few days we spent time looking around Dublin - including eating breakfast at a good bagel shop in Temple Bar twice, having Mongolian BBQ, doing some shopping, seeing Shrek the Third, and getting absolutely soaked to the bone one day when the normal rain turned into a torrential downpour.
Anyway, here are some pics of Dublin (which is named after a black pool where two rivers met - black pool being Dubh Linn in Old Norse):
 The location of the Dubh Linn, which no longer exists after one of the rivers being diverted long ago |  The House of Lords, which has been unchanged for 200 years since the parlament voted itself out of existence |
 Dublin Castle and one of the 2 remaining corner towers |  Some dashing young fellow outside the Guinness Store House in Dublin |
 The throne in Dublin Castle. Some Cannucks thought it would be cool to get a pic siting on it, although it is clearly not allowed (am I becoming German??) |  Bel and a pile of barrels in the Guinness Store House. I like that it says Butt... |
 St Patricks Cathederal - nuff said. |
After that it headed south to see more of Ireland...
Tschüß,
'Brushy
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