Dublin

April 13th
Dublin

I was scheduled for a tour today, but after finding out that we had a late sail from Dublin, my rehearsal got moved to the morning so that I couldn’t go on my tour to the Guinness Factory, something I was really looking forward to. So the day started with a morning rehearsal, and after a light lunch, I got off the ship with John to go look around Dublin.
After catching our shuttle into town, there was a certain area of town that John wanted to check out because of a Handel Celebration that was going on. Apparantly, we happened to show up on the 278th anniversary of Handel’s Messiah, which was first performed in Dublin on April 13th. It was kind of a strange coincidence, and honestly, a strange holiday to celebrate, but they had music in the streets in certain areas of town with some events being free. So our first stop was at an outdoor concert, which we stayed for 10 minutes before deciding to move on.
The next stop was the one place I actually wanted to see, the Guinness Factory! We walked across the city to get there, I bought a student ticket with my old college ID, and we entered an unbelievable museum dedicated to Guinness Beer. And it really was a well put together museum, spread over 7 floors, including everything from the production to the advertisement of the product, and a pint of “the black stuff” at the end.
I learned three things today. First, I had no idea Guinness Beer and the Guinness Book of Records were one in the same, the latter being started by the former sparked on by a conversation about the fasted game bird. Second, I wanted to figure out why all the old Guinness ads use a toucan, which seems like a strange spokesperson for beer. Guinness had a saying, “Guinness is good for you”, so if one pint is good, imagine what “two-can” do! And third, I learned how to pour the perfect pint of Guinness out of a tap, and was given a certificate to prove it. There is a technique to it, and after learning it, I feel I’m well on my way to becoming a bar tender…or not.
John and I hung out there for a while just taking our time, which in the end would have been a lot better than going on a tour, where I would have been rushed through the place and wouldn’t have enjoyed it nearly as much. So after ample time spent, we left to make our way back towards the main street of the city that we’d missed earlier in the day, planning on stopping at the first bar we found that started with an “O”. We grabbed a Cornish pastry on the way, which was quite good, and just kind of walked through the city. The main street was nothing but shopping, so that didn’t interest us too much. We eventually ended up at a shopping mall where John could by an infant sized shirt for his granddaughter, and where I used my phone to get online. For whatever reason, this shopping center had signs everywhere advertising its free WiFi, yet they made you pay to use their bathrooms…I guess that’s just Ireland for you.
We eventually started running out of time, and after somehow avoiding every bar that started with an “O”, we returned to the shuttle without ever stopping for another drink. But after the amount of walking we did and our upcoming show that night, we didn’t mind, happily returned to the ship with a good feeling for the city, and finished out the night as usual. It was a nice day and nice to be back in Ireland after about 3 years elsewhere in the world. Thanks for reading, your next pint of Guinness is on me!