Hi all!
Slept pretty well last night in my first night in a dorm! Everyone that arrived before I slept was quite nice. One Croatian guy, one Irish guy, two Spanish girls and a Brazilian guy. We had a good chat about Brazil!! Only woke up once when the girl in the bed above me arrived. Mum - the earplugs are awesome! I just hope I didn't snore or sleep talk. But let's be honest, those of you who know me well know I probably did. Oops!
Had some breakfast this morning, pretty good for a hostel with fruit and cereal! Talked to an Italian guy. Having travelled to lots of the places people are from gives me good conversation material haha.
Then I went walkabout again. I headed to St Patrick's cathedral. First I went to St Patrick's Park. It is said that St Patrick baptised the first Irish Christians in a well here, so the church was built to commemorate that.
The cathedral is the largest church in Ireland at 91m from east to West Point. I walked around at a leisurely pace taking in the memorials, Celtic graves and stained glass windows. There was also an exhibition about Ireland in WWI to commemorate the 100th anniversary which was interesting. Up to 50,000 Irish people died in WWI, and those who lost loved ones were awkwardly caught up in the post WWI war of independence sentiment here which saw a lot of people not want to remember those Irish who died in WWI because it was seen as a part of 'old Ireland'. The war of independence lasted four years here.
Then I walked to city hall square to join a free walking tour. Mum and I have done about 10 free walking tours with New Europe I think, and today I ticked the New Europe Dublin tour off my list! I'm so glad I did. The guide, Lisa, was absolutely brilliant and I made seven friends! I find it funny how travelling by yourself is almost like Kindergarten. You start talking to someone and after five minutes you're friends! I spent the whole tour talking to two Australian girls who I'm going on a pub crawl with tonight (it won't be like Poland mum, promise!) and then after the tour I asked a girl for directions and she asked if I wanted to walk around with her and four other solo travellers who had formed a group!!
The tour took us past city hall, Dublin castle (which I was going to do a tour of but three people now have told me it isn't worth it so I skipped it!!), the Chester Beatty Library, Temple Bar district and Trinity College. Along the way we laughed at Lisa's jokes and got a bit of a history lesson too. Here are some Ireland facts I learned along the way..... Ireland was originally settled by the celtics who came over from France in 600 BC. 12% of today's population speak Gaelic. St Patrick converted Ireland to Christianity in the fourth century, but he wasn't actually Irish, he was welsh! In the 12th century the English came over and took over. The name Dublin comes from the Gaelic words Dubh Linh meaning 'black pool' which refers to the Wicklow mountains and their lakes and rivers, but Dublin came about due to the English combining Gaelic words to make them easier to say/write. So there you go!! Also - mid tour I had one of the best slices of chocolate cake ever. Picture attached for you Robyn! Thought you would like.
As I said before, then I ended up walking around with five other solo travellers! Amanda from Brazil, David from Melbourne (who knows people that went to my school!), Sean and Brendan from California and Allesandra from Toronto. We walked to Merrion Square park where we saw the Oscar Wilde statue and enjoyed the greenery. Then we went to St Stephen's a Green and enjoyed more beautiful parkland! Shame it was cloudy and colllllld today but never mind!
Then we walked up Grafton Street, one of the main shopping streets. Saw a few street performers and then made a detour to the Molly Malone statue. The statue was erected due to lyrics from a song that became Dublin's unofficial anthem!
Now I've headed back to the dorm. I had a shower and am going on the pub crawl tonight with Lisa and Fiona from the tour too. It'll be good, the same company as the free tour run it so there'll be a guide and a group of us.
Talk to you all tmro on St Paddy's day! Woooo!
Love to all
Claire
Xoxox
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