Day #4 - Guinness Brewery, Dublin Castle, Book of Kells

Thursday, March 18

Before I start my post today, let me explain something. I do have a plan here in Europe with my travels. I have built in flexibility, but do have an itinerary. Have you ever heard of the book - "1,000 Places to See Before You Die". There is 402 of these places in Europe. My goal is to see them all. Pretty aggressive, let's see if I can do it.

Now, I will say that there are a lot of restaurants and hotels in the book that I will not necessarily dine at or stay at; however, my intentions are to at least do a fly-by of all items. It's kind of like a major scavenger hunt. Here's 402 things to find/do -- go get it done. I've been following this book for a few years now. For the most part, it's pretty good. I would certainly add some things and remove others - but it does a nice job of providing an overall feel. Why do I follow this? It gives me some targets. It opens my mind up to new things and new possibilities. I will promise you that I would never even consider going to see some of these things if not for the book. I said from day 1 - keep an open mind and you'll be open to learning new things. Hopefully that will ultimately make me a better person.

All right then, today I hit the streets of downtown Dublin again. I went by the Guinness Brewery and the Dublin Castle to start the day. Guinness is the beer of choice in Ireland. I've read that 7 out of 10 beers poured in Dublin is a Guinness. The other night I was at the hotel bar. A guy came up to the bartender and said there was something in his beer - could he please have another. The bartender was very apologetic and asked the gentlemen to take a seat and he would bring one right over. The guy said that he would wait. The bartender pleaded a couple more times: "Sir, please grab a seat, I'll bring the beer right over to you - so sorry about this". I was thinking, "Dude, just pour the guy a beer and get it over with already". Not so fast my friend. A properly poured Guinness takes about 5 minutes to pour from the tap. You first pour about a third of the beer and allow it to settle for a couple minutes, then you pour another third, let it settle for a couple more minutes, and then finish it off. That, my friends, is the perfectly poured Guinness beer. This was not happening at Paddy's Day yesterday because of the crowds, however, the proper technique takes some time.

I also visited Trinity College (Ireland's oldest university) and toured the Book of Kells. This is something from my book. Basically, what I understand, the Book of Kells is a lavishly decorated copy, in Latin, of the four gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John). Now, this was a little over my head, but it was interesting to see. All I know is that these books were VERY old and I couldn't read a lick of it.

I also went by the Restaurant Patrick Guilaud and The Shelbourne Hotel. These are the 2 fanciest restaurant and hotel in Dublin. The book states these 2 places are helping recreate the image of Dublin from something more than a pub-grub-only destination.

Tonight I have to do some major research as I plan to hit the outskirts of Ireland via train starting tomorrow. I'm not sure the direction I will go first - I need to hit the books. I anticipate the fast paced action to cool off some; however, I expect the sites and scenery to only be enhanced. Stay tuned.