Day 2 was not just a walk in the park.

Before anything else, I need to say that although this is a very nice hotel, its wifi in the room is really lousy. It pops in and out and goes from slow to fast to nonexistent in a matter of minutes. It's fine in the lobby, but not here.

Today I got up a bit early and took a walk around St. Stephen's Green, a park across the street from the hotel. I don't believe Stephen himself had anything to do with the green, in spite of the possessive. I think I'd heard that the Guinness family donated the park to the city and it's a very nice place.

There's a pond somewhere not in the picture that would be pretty with less garbage floating in it, but it doesn't seem to bother the ducks. Which reminds me, they don't have Duck Tours here- they have Viking Tours, with the same kind of vehicle and you have to wear Viking helmets while you ride, and no, I'm not kidding. They all yell something out as they pass the hotel.

Anyway, the park is very nice first thing in the morning. I'm sure it's nice most of the time, but it was very pleasant and quiet when I was there. There are lots of statues and lot of little nooks. Here are my favorite statues.

 

I like the first one, of Robert Emmet, because all it says about itself is that it was donated by the Robert Emmet Statue Committee and then names the committee members. The right one is a Henry Moore and it's of Yeats, or at least that's what it says.

So after than nice little walk, I came back and had my first Full Irish Breakfast. That's a thing, though it means slightly different foods depending on where you are. Mine had eggs, Irish bacon (kind of like thin Canadian bacon, but in strips), sausage, broiled tomato, sauteed mushrooms, potatoes, and black and white pudding, which are kind of like little discs of something grainy- one white, one dark, both tasty. That was a lot of food and I didn't really come close to finishing, but I gave it a good try.

Our first stop this morning was Trinity College, home of the Old Library and the Book of Kells. The Book is much older than the Library, though nobody knows exactly how old. Over 1000 years ago. It's an illuminated manuscript of the four gospels, considered to be among the finest of its sort, and it's very famous and people line up to get a peek.

The problem with this, of course, is that it's a book. It's small and old and in a case so you can't turn the pages. So there's a very nice exhibit before you get to the book itself where you learn about Irish scribes and how books like these were made. Interesting. Then you go into the room with the book, which is a single rectangular case with a crowd around it. People tend to be a bit pushy here, and I mean that literally. There's no hesitation to encroach on your personal space and try to squeeze by. I think that may be a tourist thing more than an Irish thing, but I do know that last night at the pub I was standing getting napkins and one person tried to squeeze by me in front and one tried to simultaneously squeeze by me behind and they were both annoyed that I didn't get out of their ways.

So my rule is if you are standing in a crowd around something in a museum, if at all possible stand behind children or teenagers. Those people have the attention span of a flea, so while a 45 year-old might linger for a few minutes, the kids will be out of there in 30 seconds tops. The book is very cool. I like illuminated manuscripts, and this is a good one.

From there, we went into a long room called, sorry, the Long Room. 

Pretty long, isn't it? It's an old library of textbooks, according to the guide. He was describing all the bay and shelf labels, which are necessary to locate any book because the books are sorted by size, not by topic. Also, the lower level, built in 1712, is almost 200 years older than the upper level. He said that the students are allowed to request a book and they can have it from 8:30 AM to 4:30 PM and read it in the little nook all the way in the back on the second level. We also asked hm about whether the room is climate controlled, to which he replied by pointing to an open window. He said that they do check regularly.

From there, we went to the National Museum because they had a Vermeer. It was incredibly beautiful, as they all are. What a treat to find one here. By this time it was only early afternoon and I had more adventure in store, but that's enough for now, I'll fill in the rest of the day later.