Dublin to Dunmore East – Kaitlyn O'Hagan

Tuesday morning was Dublin Day 2, and it started relatively late, with breakfast at around 845. My dad and I then set off for a walk across Dublin to the Kilmainham Gaol, Dublin’s jail from the turn of the 19^th century until 1926, and the site where the leaders of the 1916 Rebellion were executed.

It is a great, well-done museum, and the tour was very interesting, especially as someone who knew very little about Irish history. After taking a tea break, we decided we didn’t want to walk across the entire city again, and so we caught a bus back to the city center. It was a double decker, and we sat on top – my first time! Perhaps I’m easily excited, but it was pretty cool. We then went to Trinity College…

And visited the Book of Kells exhibit. It was also really interesting, as I knew very little about illuminated manuscripts. The books they have at Trinity (Kells and a few others) are absolutely beautiful, and the historian in me was itching take a look at some of the thousands of rare books they had lining their “Long Room.”

Already the sun was setting, but we walked to Dublin castle…

Thought the castle itself was closed to visitors, there was a beautiful garden behind the castle that we walked through…

We then met up with my cousin for some delicious dinner and desert at an Italian restaurant, Pacinos, on Grafton Street, which is Dublin’s big shopping center. We headed back to the Hotel, took a dip in the pool and Jacuzzi, and then hit the sack early (the amount of walking we did was extremely tiring!).

Yesterday morning we got up around the same time, and took our last walk to Dublin’s city center to change some more money. On the way I sent off a batch of 10 postcards to friends and family back home. We then got in the car to drive to Waterford, but spent at least half an hour trying to find the highway that we wanted to take. We were unsuccessful, but we got on a highway going down the east coast that worked just as well, albeit a bit longer. Once in Waterford, we were again lost, looking for our hotel, but were able to find it finally. Since it was too late for any sightseeing, we simply took a drive down the coast, and saw some beautiful cliffs as the sun set…