Dublin

At 8.50 am we met the bridge group to go on a bus tour to Glendalough and then come back through Dublin.

As we headed through town we saw many bridges across the River Liffey that flows through the centre of Dublin. Its main tributaries include the River Dodder, the River Poddle and the River Camac. I was totally amused by these names.

We also saw the statues in memory of the famine of 1845-1849 which killed over 1 million people, which was one eighth of the population. The famine was caused by potato crop failures due to blight. The farmers were basically subsistence farmers and when this occurred they could not provide food for their families. The bus driver also referred to this as a case of genocide as the British took all the corn and left the Irish with no food. I have googled and cannot find reference to this, but you can see how the strong feelings of the past have not totally diminished.

We also went past a building that had many windows bricked up. The driver said this was the origins of the saying ‘Daylight Robbery’. In 1696, William 111 of England introduced a window tax whereby  people had to pay tax for each window they had in their house. So people boarded or bricked up their windows and lived without sunlight. This lasted in the UK until 1851. There are other references on the internet that dispute this origin of the saying – but I like this one. I as on the wrong side of the bus so couldn’t get a photo but you can see some at this link:

It took about 1.5 hours to get to Glendalough which is a monastic ruin from the 12^th century. The cathedal was originally built for Saints Peter and Paul.  It stopped being a cathedral in 1241. It was fascinating to see all the ancient tombstones that were so weathered you could not see the writing clearly. We found one that clearly showed 1790.

After Glendalough we had lunch in a quaint village before heading back to Dublin for a drive around the city.

We drove through Phoenix Park which is larger in area than Central Park. They are preparing for a visit by the Pope in 2 weeks’ time when they are expecting massive crowds. I am glad we are here now!

We got back to the ship about 4 pm after a very long day in a bus.

 

Then at about 6 p.m we caught a taxi back into town to go to an Irish music and dance night at the Belvedere Hotel. We had found this on Trip Advisor several months before we left Australia and booked our tickets as it had really high ratings. Lucky we did as it was packed out. We thought we were going to a Pub type hotel, but it was actually an accommodation Hotel with the room for the Irish Music nights. Much more upmarket than we expected. We sat in the formal bar and had a drink while we waited for the music night to commence.

 

It started with a 3 course meal at 7 pm. This was lovely considering they were feeding over 100 people in a very short space of time. We had 3 options for each course and the whole meal was lovely. Then, just after 8 pm the music started. You will see from the movies the rage of entertainment provided. They had us clapping and singing along. We were sitting between a French couple and American couple who were surprised that I knew most of the songs. I told them it was our convict heritage!

I didn’t know anything about the drum the girl was playing, but she explained it is called a ‘bodhran ‘  pronounced ‘Bow-rawn’ and she actually said ‘You will need to know that for trivia nights”.  It is an Irish frame drum usually covered with goat’s skin. Hers was made from kangaroo skin.

The hosts asked what countries the audience were from and I think about one quarter were Aussies. There was a huge table of young people near us with a mix of Aussies, New Zealanders and Americans. One girl I spoke to was from Cootamundra – it is such a small world!

Please note these are the first movies I have taken all holiday. Paul did not take his movie camera so I tried the movie setting on my 6 year old, $100,  Olympus camera and they turned out OK.

We had a fabulous night. It ended just before 10 pm which gave us time to get a taxi back and have a few tia marias before the ship sailed at midnight.