I arrived in Dublin at dawn. That was the last time I saw the silent city. I had breakfast with sausages and bacon and juices and weak coffee in the Bed & Breakfast I randomly picked online. The sun came out to challenge the tough topic and show the bridges across the river Liffey.
Dublin has the activity of big cities: their tour buses, your fast food restaurants, its statues to tell the story with a petrified gesture, their teenagers talking loudly on the sidewalks, its poor reaching out their hand to ask for compensation for their misfortune…
I was confused with a street map in hand without hiding my status as a tourist, clumsy and smiling. I visited the churches and the castles, the gray and solemn facades of the University, with its gardens and its rugby fields. But only in the tourist breaks one ceases to be.
inside the pubs, the Irish have managed to extend the concept of home, more ethyl maybe, but just as cozy
I was traveling without company and therefore without debates. He was free and had the anonymity that a new city grants. Even so, I felt a certain misgiving about going in to drink alone at eleven in the morning., but i couldn't help it. I was irresistibly attracted to the wooden signs of Irish pubs, its gleaming bars, his way of making you feel good. I ordered a pint of Guinness and in that instant I was sure that I could live in that place. It was any pub, no more luster than others, but it is that inside the pubs, the Irish have managed to extend the concept of home, more ethyl maybe, but just as cozy as your own home.
Conditioned by bitter experience, foamy and affordable from a dark beer, I decided to visit the Guinness factory and about three quarters of an hour later I stood with a group of tourists in one of the most emblematic buildings in the country. Ugly on the outside and very interesting on the inside. A tour from plant to plant took us through the barley harvesting processes, the toast, yeast selection, the manufacture of the barrels and all those things that end up being forgotten, while tasting one of those magical pints at the top of the museum, in a glass gazebo, from which you can see the whole city.
Temple Bar is the most Irish neighborhood in Ireland and that is why it is full of foreigners who "de-Irish" it
But Dublin is not a city with a contemplative vocation. You have to experience Dublin from within and for this it is essential to integrate into the Temple Bar. It is the most Irish neighborhood in Ireland and that is why it is full of foreigners who "un-Irish" it. If one is able to put aside the paradox, you will have a good time.
I got there as the day had started: confused, clumsy and smiling. And I did what I suppose everyone who crosses these streets for the first time does, I got carried away. music leads the way: the usual virtuous, rock bands, impossible guitars… and all washed down with beer. The night turns the home of pubs into a party. when the sun goes down, Dublin is in a good mood, and it's contagious. My lonely traveler shyness was dispelled with the pints of Guinness, with the musical push and with the parade of drunks. Every bar is a museum, a sacred precinct in which to forget about the rain and the crisis. And so, with the night rushing sips, one ends up more confused, clumsier and more smiling than at the beginning. Perhaps the Dublin night is better perceived when it is out of focus. After, I was waiting for a way back to the Bed & Brakfast somewhat longer than the way there.
The next day I wanted to redeem myself from that excess by going to an Irish music and dance show, of the real ones, one of those where boys and girls put their feet up a lot and a band plays celtic instruments. And I. And I applauded a lot together with about a hundred and thirty tourists who had decided to see an authentic show away from the tourists of Temple Bar. Traditions survive in many cases thanks to foreigners.
It was a green ride. So green it made me want to graze
I had fun in Dublin, but i wanted to get out and breathe the country air and took a bus across the country to the west coast. It was a green ride. So green it made me want to graze. green meadows, green fields and even some green eyes that were already looking at the sea from the shores of Galway. Ireland is full of ruins, of Celtic crosses and ancestral tombs that seem to sprout with the rain among so much green. I imagined the hordes of vikings landing on these shores, the Normans and the Celts. And then the journey ended at the cliffs of Moher, the most abrupt that I had ever seen. Ireland is suddenly over and down.
Next to the abysses stands the Torre de O'Brian, so lonely it's embarrassing to see her profile, your helplessness. From there I could only dedicate myself to looking at a wild landscape, the untamed land and the open sea. Hours later I would return to the shelter of Temple Bar to say goodbye to Ireland with a toast before returning home.
