Lovely day for a Guinness

Welcome to Dublin!

Weather: Sunny, Cloudy, some rain

Hostel: Generator Hostel

I landed on June 9th in Ireland to meet friends for the next leg of the trip. It's getting much busier now so these will be slightly less detailed. And so many more photos to go through. Dublin was pretty walkable, we didn't get on the public transport at all.

The first day in Dublin we made our way to the Generator Hostel- a nice chain hostel option in multiple cities. It didn't have the charm of some of the Portugal spots I stayed in, which were smaller and more personalized, but it was good for what we needed. We had a private room and en suite, and it was pretty quiet. Lunch was a delicious spread of a full Irish breakfast at Wuff.

We made our way to the Guinness Storehouse for a tour and the Academy, where they teach you to pour a Guinness the proper way. Highly recommend this tour- it was super detailed and interesting to walk through. It was a self-guided tour, but the Academy part was worth it. We also had a drink at the Gravity Bar, which was basically a rooftop bar that was covered in plants and very nice. We found a nice pub for dinner, apparently Ireland's oldest! The Brazen Pub. Started out my Irish food with some fish and chips...

Next morning we had a little time to sleep in, which was good for the jet-lagged folks! We had a pretty relaxed day, we started out at Trinity College, walking around the grounds, and admiring the college founded in 1592. We reserved a time for the Book of Kells and the Long Room tour for the following day. Then we walked around St. Stephens Green, a cool city park that also played a big part in the 1916 Easter Rising as the spot of most of the fighting. We also found the National Gallery of Art and spent a couple hours walking around there, super interesting and free spot!

After the art gallery, we found a random pub for dinner...there's so many. Had another Guinness because well, you have to.

The next day we spent the whole morning on a tour to the Wicklow Mountains and Glendalough! We paid for an organized tour from Paddywagon tours. Which was super nice and the tour guide was awesome. He talked most of the way out there, about an hour, and the bus was comfy and super easy to find. We had 2 hours to walk through the old monastic city and went on a mile-ish hike to 2 lakes and a waterfall. They filmed a lot of movies out in the Wicklow Mountains, Braveheart, P.S. I Love You, Enchanted, and more. I get why-it's beautiful out there!

After getting back into the city, we went to the Irish Potato Cake Company- great lunch deals. Then we had a tour for the Book of Kells and Long Room, which was very worth it. The Long Room was the prettiest and most impressive library I've ever seen!

We found a nice pub, recommended because of the live music, called the Cobblestone and went there to hear some traditional Irish music. That's something I would really recommend doing-finding live and authentic music at a local spot.