20-21 June 2024 Introduction
to Dublin Blog
Today we started our journey to the beautiful, lush green
county of Ireland. We flew from Denver
to Newark where we overnighted before our flight to Dublin. The next evening we flew from Newark to
Dublin, arriving about 7 AM the next morning.
Thank goodness for lie-flat seats – they are a life-saver!
Dublin, located on the east coast of the country, is the
capital of the Republic of Ireland and is a city steeped in history,
literature, and pubs. The name Dublin
comes from the Irish word Dubhlind – Dubh means” black or dark”
while lind means” pool.” It
refers to the dark pools found where the River Poddle enters the Liffey, the
river that runs through the center of Dublin.
In Irish, the river Liffey is known as “An Life” and is mentioned often
in the great literary works of the Irish authors and songwriters. Known as the city of “saints and scholars,”
its culture is filled with legends, songs, and stories.
While Dublin officially declares 988 as the year of the
first Viking settlement on what would later become Dublin, there is some
indication that before the Vikings arrived there was a Christian settlement
that was known as Duibhlinn. Today there
is still a little controversy over the recent construction of government
buildings in Wood Quay, which was the
site of this first settlement. And just
to the west of Wood Quay, archaeologists have found a large number of Viking
warrior burials. This area, Kilmainham-Islandbridge,
is now considered the largest burial complex of its type in western Europe
(with the notable exclusion of Scandinavia).
The Vikings kept control of the area until 1169 when the
Normans invaded Ireland. Then in the 16th
century the Tudors conquered Ireland, making Dublin the center of
administrative rule in Ireland. In 1592,
Queen Elizabeth I of England, wanting to make Dublin a Protestant city,
established Trinity College a Protestant-only university.
The 18th century was a prosperous time in Dublin
with a large increase in building and expansion – most of the architecture you
see today came from that era. During
that time, it was the second largest city in the British Empire and the fifth
largest in Europe.
However, the signing of the Acts of Union in 1800, that
officially made Ireland part of Great Britain, ushered in a period of political
and economic unrest and decline. With
Dublin no longer the seat of the government, many politicians and aristocrats
returned to London. Opposition was
strong against this change in government, and by the beginning of the 1900’s,
revolutionary groups were being formed and protests held. The Easter Rising of 1916, the Irish War of
Independence, and the ensuing Irish Civil War all resulted in a considerable
amount of damage to buildings in Dublin.
Following Ireland’s independence from Great Britain in 1949,
Dublin began to grow as not only the capital of the Republic of Ireland, but as
a popular tourist destination. There is
much to see in Dublin, as we shall soon learn, from historical sites like the
Dublin Castle to majestic Cathedrals like St. Patrick’s to the numerous museums
that are found throughout the city.
Two things are very apparent in Dublin. First, they love their beer with 666 licensed
pubs to prove it. The oldest pub dates
back to 1198. As James Joyce once
wrote: “A good puzzle would be to cross
Dublin without passing a pub.” And the
most Irish answer to this puzzle –“ visit them all.” Perhaps the most important fact of Dublin’s
history, especially if you like beer, is that the famous Guinness beer was
first brewed in Dublin in 1759 at the St. James Brewery!
Now
here is a fact about Guinness beer that you don’t hear very often (if at all). According to an article that I read, about
163,000 pints of Guinness are wasted every year. Now you would expect some wastage from
glasses being dropped or the beer overflowing the glass if you do not pour it
right. But no, it was determined that
this wastage was due to beer adhering to the whiskers of a mustache! According to research done by the Guiness
brewing company, 1 ½ pints of beer is trapped in the mustache of the average
drinker. The company hired a hair
specialist who did a 2-day analysis studying the Guinness soaked mustache hair
of eight volunteers. By using
pre-weighted tissues and very accurate scales, this specialist determined
facial hair can absorb 20% of its own weight in liquid. So I guess the real question is – should you
or shouldn’t you drink beer with a mustache?
Perhaps the answer is to use a straw!
But wait – there is actually a company in Missouri that has
devised a way to avoid this beer loss.
They have a copper shield – called “whisker Dam” – that men with
mustachoes can attach to the glass to preclude the beer from adhering to their
whiskers. It is like an umbrella for
your face. This idea stemmed from a
tradition that dates back to the mid-19th century when a British
potter named Harvey Adams created the mustache cup. The cup was designed to suspend a man’s
mustache to keep it up out of the way of the cup.
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| Harvey Adam's Cup |
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| Whiskey Dam |
This is where our tour, Irish Adventure: Dublin, Belfast,
and the Northwest Counties,” begins. We
will have a few days on our own to discover Dublin and hopefully, learn more of
its past and its heritage, as we visit some of Dublin’s most important
historical and literary sites. And of
course, we will visit our fair share of Dublin’s pubs (but I can assure not all
666 of them) and enjoy the Irish cuisine and Irish music. For the first part of our Dublin tour, we
will be staying at the Temple Bar Inn very close to the famous Temple Bar and
about a block away from the Liffey River and just across the street from
Trinity College.
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