Guinness - It's More Than Just a Book of World Records

The plane didn’t crash and security didn’t escort us from the airport to make room for the Obamas so it was time to find my way into the city of Dublin.  Immigration and customs was a breeze and I was able to change some money and buy a bus ticket into Dublin City Centre from a booth in the baggage claim area.

I had looked up the bus stop closest to my hotel in Dublin and I had looked up directions from Google Maps and looked at the walk from the photos on Google Maps.  It was the first time that I had tried it and I’ll do it every time from now on.  Even though I had written down the directions from the bus stop to my hotel, I never even took them out of my pocket because having followed the direction photos on Google Maps it was like I had already been there.  It was pretty cool.

It was too early to check into my hotel, but I was able to drop off my bags and peruse the brochures at the hotel to find something to do for a handful of hours.  Needless to say, once I saw a brochure with a picture of beer on it, my mind was made up.  Yes, I decided to go to the Guinness Storehouse.

The Guinness Storehouse was about a twenty-minute walk from my hotel, under perfect circumstances.  Circumstances weren’t exactly perfect, however.  As it turned out, President Obama had decided to stalk me all the way to Dublin.  Consequently, many of the roads that I wanted to use in getting to the Guinness Storehouse had been blocked off for his visit.  I managed to get through the maze of police barricades but then it turned out that my directions to the Storehouse weren’t as good as my Google Maps directions and, all-in-all, it took about an hour to get there.  Meh . . . I had time to kill anyway.

I wrote about the Heineken Museum when I went to Amsterdam.  The Guinness Storehouse wasn’t much different other than the fact that the beer was much darker.  And better.  You got to see some hops, you got to see some barley, you got to see some water and you heard about the “special” yeast that Guinness uses.  There were old advertisements and bottles (always my second-favorite part of these tours) and free beer at the end (my favorite part of these tours).  My beer was cold.  It was good.  I was happy. 

After the Guinness Storehouse, I made my way back to the hotel in order to check-in.  My trip took me through the Temple Bar area and by this time the crowds waiting for Obama were getting huge.  There were thousands of people, many of which were carrying around American flags and wearing Obama gear.  I even heard some people chanting “USA!  USA!”  After all of my travels, I have to say that it was a little refreshing to see people with an American flag in one hand without having a lighter in the other.

After I checked into my hotel, I went upstairs and took a nap.  I was pretty much dead on my feet at this point.  I woke up around six and went back out to get a beer or two and some Irish food.  After stopping at a few places for a few Guinnesses (Guinnii?), I stopped into a restaurant for some Irish Stew.  I got a pretty good stew with potatoes, carrots and onions and a large-ass lamb shank in it. 

That was pretty much it for excitement for my first day in Ireland.  I’ll get to the second day next time.