Playful Rooted

It’s been quiet around here this week, mostly because I’m still mourning the fact that we’re no longer in Dublin. I had the best time there, and I never wanted to leave! The food was amazing, the people were super friendly (and, oh yeah, they speak English), and because it was St. Patrick’s Day weekend, the whole city was a giant, green party the whole time we were there.

It was such a fabulous trip! Here are a few of the highlights.

Trinity College

I heard from more than one source that we should check out the Trinity College campus while we were in Dublin. What really tipped it for me was that my friend Jess told me that the library there made her feel like she was at Hogwarts. Immediately, it became a “must do” for me, and I’m really glad we went.

The whole campus is totally gorgeous!

Trinity College houses the Book of Kells, which is an ornately decorated, handwritten copy of the Gospel created by monks in around 800 AD. The book is awesome, and there’s also a sort of museum surrounding it which describes all the imagery and the tools they used to create the book. The monks hand-ground stones to make different colored ink, stretched calfskin to make pages, and hand-sewed the folios together. I can’t even imagine how long that kind of work took.

I didn’t get any photos of the Book of Kells, but just beyond the book exhibit is the Trinity College Library, aka, Hogwarts. 🙂

It’s so beautiful! As a true bibliophile, I got goose bumps in here, surrounded by all these books.

Guinness Factory Tour

After spending some time in the city center, we went to the Guinness Factory, which was even better than I was expecting! We did the full tour, and I learned a lot about beer making and storage. The most interesting part to me was learning how beer casks are made. Who knew that could be so fascinating?

When you go on the tour, you get a ticket for a free pint, which is of course part of the appeal. We sat down at a table with another couple and ended up chatting with them for quite a while. They were visiting from Atlanta, so it kind of felt like being at home. 🙂 They asked lots of questions about all the traveling we’ve done here, and I think we assuaged some of their fears about traveling when you only speak English. It can be done!

St. Patrick’s Day 5K

Ben and I run a road race in Chicago for St. Patrick’s Day almost every year, so I was really excited to keep this tradition alive in Dublin. Plus, I thought it would be huge because… it’s Dublin! However, compared to a Chicago race, it was actually quite tiny.

It was still great fun though! Almost everyone had their faces painted pre-race, and lots of people wore gaudy green St. Pat’s gear. I love races that aren’t too serious. I stuck to a sparkly shamrock, but Ben, as is his wont, went all out with “Kiss me” on his forehead, “USA” on one cheek, and the Irish flag on his other cheek.

That’s my husband.

We got there about two minutes before the race started, so we were pretty much at the back – luckily, there were only a couple hundred people in front of us. That’s how small this race was!

Ben and I both finished in around 28 minutes, which we were totally satisfied with, having not trained a single step for this 5K. 🙂

Chillin’ out, maxin’, relaxin’ all cool

While I freaked out over books and barrel-making, this is how Ben chose to approach Dublin.

🙂

Here’s a random shot of Dublin Castle. We’re all castled out (once you’ve seen one twenty, you’ve seen ‘em all), so we didn’t go in, but we did enjoy a picnic lunch just outside.

We went to a Craft Beer and Whiskey market on Sunday, and amid all that imbibing, I forgot to take pictures. I love a good craft beer, so it was a really good time, although we ended up donating the whiskey to some really friendly (and grateful) Irish boys beside us. 🙂

On the walk back to town, we passed several official buildings all lit up in green for St. Pat’s day. They really love greening the city, which is so fun! Here’s the Bank of Ireland.

I read online after we came back home to France that St. Patrick’s Day is totally an American construct, and I have to highly disagree. I don’t know about the rest of Ireland, but Dublin certainly goes crazy!

Food and drink

We ate and drank extremely well in Dublin. It was so easy to find vegan food every single place we went! In fact, my biggest problem in the city was over-ordering at every restaurant. Appetizers and desserts with every meal? Why not? It’s just so hard to say no to something you know you’ll be deprived of for months. Montpellier has nothing on Dublin in the plant-based food department. Luckily, we walked everywhere, or I would be coming back much heavier than when we left!

Way too soon, we were back at the airport, getting on a plane to Paris. I found this insane and had to snap a photo – this is the boarding pass checkpoint in the Dublin airport. You just swipe the barcode in your boarding pass over one of the scanners. They don’t check your passport or anything! It’s so wild.

Two planes, a train, two shuttles, and a tram later, we were back in Montpellier. This girl was very glad to see us.

We did not get to spend nearly enough time in Ireland, so it’s absolutely on our list of places to return. In the taxi to the airport, the driver told us we’ve got to rent a car and explore the western part of the country. That’s in our plans for next time, and I’m really hoping next time is sooner rather than later!

xo!