Dublin 2 - A Horse Fair, Dolphins and All Dressed Up and Nowhere to Go!

May 6th

The Horse Market at Smithfield

I was woken up by the sounded of the clip-clopping of horseshoes, it turned out a horse fair was taking place at Smithfield.  The fair happens on the first Sunday of every month and has been doing so for around 400 years. The horse market is controversial due to accusations of cruelty and occasional violence between the traders and authorities have been trying to close or move it for a few years.  As we watched from our balcony we noticed there was a police presence and a large area was barricaded off where the traders looked at and tested out the horses and we saw nothing untoward whilst we watched.

Today we decided to do something we hadn't done for a few years, spend a few hours mooching around our favourite areas of South County Dublin.  We took the Luas to Connolly Station and then changed to the DART and headed out to Killiney.  The trip on the train is a wonderful journey as it runs along the scenic coast of Dublin and Killiney Bays.  I never tire of the view of Killiney Bay as the train emerges from the tunnel under Dalkey Hill, it is stunning.

Killiney Bay

It was a blustery, showery day as we walked the short distance from the station to the beach, but it is a fabulous place whatever the weather.  The tide was in, and we walked along the beach which only had a handful of other people on it.  Suddenly I noticed black fins in the water off-shore - it was a small school of dolphins frolicking in the sea.  I'd heard that dolphins now frequent this area but never expected to see them!

After our walk we got the DART and went one station north and got off at Dalkey. We went to The Queens pub for a late lunch.  It was very full, we found one table, but soon were surrounded by a horde of "merry" young men watching the football on the TV nearby (I seem to be getting plagued by loud alcohol-fuelled men on this trip!)  Luckily there was now space at the other end of the pub and we moved there.  We had a delicious lunch for a very reasonable price washed down with Irish red lemonade.

Declan and Me

We intended to have a browse in The Exchange Bookshop on the main street, but were sad to see it had closed just a month earlier.  What a shame, it was a great place to potter around in.  After this we headed back home.

That evening, our friend Declan came round to our apartment, we hadn't seen him for a while so there was a lot of catching up to do.  We had a lovely evening, I'm so pleased that we had managed to meet up with all our Dublin friends on this trip.

After he left Debbi and I had a few more bevvies, just for a change .

May 7th

At lunch time we went to Bewleys Cafe Theatre.  For E8 you get soup, soda bread and a drink and see a play lasting 50 minutes, excellent value.  We have been many times and have always really enjoyed the play. The Cafe Theatre is a medium sized room above the floors of the cafe,  filled with tables and chairs with the small stage set on a dais in one corner.  The huge windows are covered with thick, red velvet curtains.

We got our soup, soda bread and water and found a table from which we had a good view.  The play we were seeing was A Galway Girl by Geraldine Aron starring Joe Hanley and Clare Barrett. It depicts a marriage from the start to the death one one partner.  Beautifully acted, Maisie and Dermot saw their different dreams gradually drift away as the years passed by.  Ending up living separate lives of quiet desperation in the same house until death did them part.  Very moving and at times very funny,  so typically Irish.  I love the intimacy of this theatre, I've seen plays here for a very long time and have never been disappointed, if you are in Dublin go there, you won't be disappointed - lunch and theatre for E8 to E12 (depending on which day you go) that's what I call good value.

We went back to our apartment and later got dressed up for our meal out at one of our favourite restaurants The Town Bar and Grill.  It was a windy, very wet night and we took a taxi there, paid and were left on the pavement looking at a padlock on the door of the dark restaurant!  There we were, all dressed up and nowhere to go being buffeted by the wind and rain.  We had to find somewhere else to eat.  The nearest place was Buswell's Hotel, we stumbled in hungry and windswept, but their restaurant was closed too!  We checked out the menu in the very quiet bar but we wanted fine dining and a place with a bit more life.  Debbi  told the barman what had happened and asked if he could recommend another similar restaurant nearby and he suggested Marco Pierre White's Restaurant.  He was such a wonderful, helpful man that he even offered to ring the restaurant and book us a table, how lovely of him!  Then he took us to the door and showed us where to go and indeed, it was close by.

Us in Marco Pierre White's Restaurant

It was almost full and had a good atmosphere, the decor mainly brown and cream with a row of black and white photos of celebrities from all eras around the room.  The waiting staff were  pleasant and informal and the food was good.  We both had goats cheese and beetroot to start, it was a large portion and gorgeous.  I had ribeye steak which was very tender, accompanied by chips.  Deb had her favourite meat, lamb which she said was also very good.  I'm certainly not a fan of Marco Pierre White, but his restaurant in Dublin is excellent. So the night was saved for us by the barman at Buswell's Hotel, thank you!

I emailed the Town Bar and Grill and they apologised and said they had sent me an email saying they would be closed that night but I never received it, it must be floating up with the Northern Lights in cyberspace or something.  They offered free cocktails next time we visit Which made up a little for our inconvenience and disappointment.

Restaurant Review - The Town Bar and Grill, Dublin

Location

Central location in Kildare Street, Dublin, Ireland.

Cuisine
European/Mediterranean

Ambience
The restaurant is a converted wine cellar and is long and narrow with low ceilings.  The decor is modern with muted colours, low lighting.  Some of the original brick wine cellar walls have been left bare which give it atmosphere. 

Large parties are put in the back section of the restaurant, due to the low ceilings this means it can be noisy there if such parties are present, we usually ask for a table at the front where it tends to be quieter.  Some evenings there is a piano player providing background music.

General
The food is excellent with decent sized portions and a good, varied choice is always on offer.  I had fxa goats cheese and beetroot starter which was delicious, the goats cheese was very light, almost like a mousse.  For my main I chose the ribeye steak which was charcoal grilled and as tender as can be.  For dessert I was torn, the tiramisu in this restaurant is the best I have ever had, gorgeous!  But they had a assiette of desserts on offer which was five tasters of all the main desserts on offer, including tiramisu, lemon rice, cheesecake, pecan pie.  Very good, and the tiramisu was the still the best!

Service
The staff are very pleasant and attentive and will also hail you a taxi after your meal.

Price
Expensive, but it is worth the money.  They do also have reasonable lunch and pre-theatre menus available.

Northern Star Rating  *****

New Year 2011 in Dublin

December 30th 2010

Happy New Year to you all.  I was in Dublin to see 2011 come in, no better place to be!  You can read about our short trip below.

Debbi and I met up in Manchester -  we were so lucky that the wintry weather had abated just days previously and we had no problems getting from our homes to Manchester.  Unfortunately though fog proved to be a problem, delaying the incoming flights from Dublin, including our plane.  However, we were only delayed about 40 minutes which wasn't too bad. 

We were chatting away as we were descending into Dublin when suddenly the plane made a very sudden, steep climb, I could hear the screech of the engines as they powered the sudden ascent.  Everyone went strangely quiet, knowing there was some kind of problem.  Shortly afterwards the pilot announced that the piece of machinery that aides an automatic landing in fog was not working and that's why they aborted the landing and that they had to do "a bit of work to do" on the flight deck.  The plane remained very quiet, I don't particularly like flying and this didn't help my now well controlled fear of flying!  But, 20 minutes later we landed safely - phew!

We got a bus to South Great Georges Street near Dublin Castle.  We were met there by Sean, the owner of the cottage we were renting for our few days in Dublin.  It took us ten minutes to get to the cottage off John Dillon Street in The Liberties.  The cottage was one of those small, one story homes that you see all over the city, this one was set in a small square of six cottages, with the old Dublin city wall running along one side.  Our cottage was so cute, with fabulous original window panes on the frontage.  It had a sitting room, two  bedrooms, a bathroom and kitchen - all small but well designed and it had everything we needed.  There was even a little yard with a seat at the back.  It was cosy and had a lovely feel about it, it was very homely - we loved our little cottage from the word go.

Our first job after unpacking was to go to the nearby shops for some provisions.  The area was mainly residential terrace houses set inbetween Dublin's two main cathedrals Christchurch and St Patricks. The area is known as The Liberties because being outside the city walls the areas had been self ruling to a point.

That evening we had been due to go to Dun Laoghaire for dinner with friends.  However, a family illness meant that had to be cancelled.  So, instead Debbi and I stayed in and had pizza and wine - lots of wine and talked for six hours solid!  You certainly know when you are with a good friend when you can just chill and chat like that.

31st December 2010



I had a bit of a bad head today!  LOL.  I went out for a walk around the local area to clear my head and took a few photos along the way.  This area is a stones throw from Temple Bar, yet is very quiet.  Near our square was the back entrance to a grand, derelict building called The Iveagh Market, that fronts onto nearby Francis Street.  It was built in 1902 to house market traders who previously sold their wares on the local streets.  

Also nearby was Mother Redcaps Tavern, built 1760, once one of Dublin's premier live entertainment pubs, now closed.  Both these building were earmarked for demolition to make way for apartments, offices, hotels, but since the recession has hit Ireland these buildings may actually be saved from destruction and the area will keep it's strong sense of history.  Too much of Dublin has been turned into characterless concrete, steel and glass.



Graffiti near our cottage

We took it easy that afternoon (this was to be a very taking it easy type of holiday ), then got ourselves spruced up and got a taxi to the Town Bar and Grill in Kildare Street for our evening meal. 

We always enjoy our meals there and this night was no exception.  We both chose the same courses.  Goats cheese and beetroot starter, ribeye steak main, and an assiette of desserts (small portions of all the desserts on offer) all of which were delicious.  We washed it down with a delicious Valpolicella, c'est la vie!  The serving staff pour your wine for you, but I wanted Deb to have more than me as, due to my hiatus hernia, I have to be careful about how much I drink (and I can only drink good red wine lol). So I tried to sneak more wine into her glass only to get caught by our waiter who said to Deb.  "I wish I had a friend who poured wine like that!"

We got a taxi home but, as is often the case in Dublin, the driver had no idea where our cottage was, or even the quite big street that the square led off from, and not being very familiar with that area we couldn't direct him.  "I'm not trying to cheat you" he kept saying, he seemed genuine and had no sat nav, so we asked him to drop us at Jury's Hotel at Christchurch as we could easily walk from there, otherwise we could have been going round The Liberties getting nowhere forever!  He took five Euro off the meter price too which was very fair.  Those Dublin taxi drivers should have to pass The Knowledge like London cabbies do!

We relaxed in our cosy cottage for a while before leaving at 11.40pm for the short walk to Christchurch Cathedral, the traditional place for Dubliners to gather to see in the New Year.  The cathedral looked beautiful all lit up in the night, the bells were ringing out as if calling the people and I was very aware of being part of something that had probably gone on for hundreds of years.  The bells stopped at around ten to twelve, by now there were hundreds of people there and the gardai had closed the road.  Then at twelve the bells chimed in 2011 and people cheered, hugged, drank champagne, set off sparklers and sky lanterns started appearing in the sky, it was a lovely atmosphere, happy and very good humoured.  

Soon the people started dispersing and we headed home. St Patricks, Dublin's other major cathedral, further down Nicholas Street also looked beautiful, its floodlit spire all lit up, it's bells ringing out too.  In five minutes we were home and we opened a bottle of Prosecco, we couldn't find a bottle of our usual celebration tipple, Veuve Clicquot, in the local shops so this was our second choice, and it was lovely.
We had kept our Christmas presents to open, strangely we bought each other similar presents!  We stayed up until 3am enjoying our Prosecco and chatting.

Christchurch Cathedral when the people were just starting to gather for the New Year bells

January 1st 2011

We had a very lazy morning, in fact we never saw the morning lol!  We find as we get older we can't just bounce back from late nights drinking a pleasant wine - we need time to recover.  Once up, dressed and awake I had another walk around the local area and bought a few things at the shop.

We had intended to walk to Grafton Street to see the lovely chandelier shaped Christmas lights we'd glimpsed from the taxi on the way to the Town Bar and Grill and to look at Brown Thomas's famous Christmas windows.  But it started raining really hard, and our little cottage was so snug and warm that we didn't need a lot of persuasion to stay in.  We have visited Dublin many, many times and seen all the sights so don't feel that we have missed out if we do this.

At 8pm we walked to The Tea Room Restaurant at The Clarence Hotel, just a ten minute stroll from our cottage, the rain had eased off by now.  We were given our usual table in the corner and ordered from the Market Menu which at E25 for three courses is very reasonable.  The waiter came to take our order then he said that a bottle of wine with our meal would be complimentary.  We thought we had heard wrong, but he repeated the same thing and asked if we had chosen a wine, we had and, still mystified, ordered a bottle of Chianti.

I had the salmon fishcake with a lovely mayo dressing for starters, then ribeye steak again for the main.  It was just as good as the one at the Town Bar and Grill, but different, as it had a delicous marinade on it.  It came with the most fabulous, crispy chunky chips.  For dessert I had chocolate fondant, with banana ice cream and toffee sauce.  Oddly, before we'd left our cottage I'd said I fancied fishcake for starters and chocolate fondant for dessert, how lucky was I?  The free wine was lovely, and we still don't know why we got it.  All I can think of is because we have stayed at the Clarence Hotel, including the penthouse, a few times and are regulars at The Tea Room.  It was a very nice gesture from the hotel and much appreciated.

After the meal we went through to The Study for cocktails and sat there for a while.  There was a pretty Christmas tree in the corner and it was very pleasant and relaxing in there.

We left the hotel at midnight and were soon home.  We didn't stay up too long as we had to be up early the next day as our short trip to Dublin was now over - though we did consider squatting in our little cottage as we loved it so much and didn't want to leave it!

Websites, Another Job, No U2 in Ireland and a Short Trip to Dublin

I've been neglecting my blog these last few weeks, I will update it more regularly from now on, this hiatus has just been a blip.   

I've been really busy with various things, one being working on a Cumbrian genealogy website that hopefully will see light of day soon.  I'm very much into genealogy, it can lead you on a fantastic and surprising journey as, like a detective, you delve into your past as you follow the clues and twists and turns of your family history.

I've got another job!  Not in place of my present little job, but in addition to it - after all it is only ten hours a week.  On Thursdays I've been working as a volunteer with Age Concern at one of their day groups for the elderly.  I really enjoy it and now am going to go on the organisation's paid staff as a bank carer - I'll fill in when regular caring staff are unavailable.

U2.com finally laid rest to all the speculation about Dublin shows by saying all the European shows for 2010 have now been announced.  I have a feeling that the band may finish the 360 Tour in Dublin next year, no one is saying the Rome show is the last gig of the tour, just of Europe in 2010.  Maybe they will get to Australasia and south America in 2011 too.  I've decided I'll just go to the two German shows I've got tickets for this year, then see what happens next year.

My friend Debbi and I have been on a short trip to Dublin recently.  I got the train to Manchester Airport and as I walked into the station I saw wallpaper on walls, armchairs, settees, lots of lights, laminate flooring.... then I remembered that I'd heard they were making an ad for Homebase at the railway station.  It really cheered the Victorian station up, they should have it like that all the time, easy chairs would be nice to relax in as you wait for your train.  The ad must be getting screened in the summer as the extras were in light clothing, some of the women were shivering in their short sleeves as they waited and waited for the next take on this icy February morning. 

I met up with Deb in Manchester and soon were were on our way to our hotel in Dublin, Bewley's.  After settling in we went out to the nearby shops and bought some wine and nibbles.  Wine is generally horrendously expensive in Ireland and there was one on special offer we fancied but it had a cork and we had no corkscrew.  The helpful shop manager offered to open it for us and I walked back with an opened bottle of red wine in a brown paper bag LOL!

We got our gladrags on and got a taxi to The Clarence Hotel where we were having a meal in the Tea Room.  Prices in that restaurant have tumbled dramatically and it is now really good value for money.  Our meal was fabulous, the chocolate fondant was to die for!  After the meal we had a cocktail in The Study (now open to anyone, not just residents) and chatted for ages.  We wanted to have one more Cosmo cocktail to share and the very helpful waiter made us two glasses topped up with the cranberry juice to make it go further.  Seems the hotel has now got a longer drinking licence letting people drink later as we left at 12.30am and usually the place is closed to non-residents from not long after 11pm. 

On the Friday we checked out Hanover Quay, but there was no sign of U2, I was quite glad we could move on as the wind was piercingly cold.   I love the name of this road close to U2's studios (photo above).  I thought it was just a weird name, but  when I Googled it I found out it was named after Bindon Blood Stoney (1828 – 1909) a civil engineer during the late 19th century. Bindon Blood Stoney was the main engineer working on Dublin Port and Docks in the second half of the 19th century.

Every time we go away now we treat ourselves to a bottle of Veuve Cliquot champagne (our tastes have got expensive as we've got older).  We meant to get a bottle at Manchester airport but, because we were flying Ryanair carrying only one piece of hand luggage to save money, we had no room for it.  It took us a while to find it, but eventually there it was, in the Eurospar in Barrow St.  So this time when I returned to Bewley's I was carrying champagne in a purple paper bag!

The Meteor Awards, in which U2 were nominated for three awards, were taking place that night at the RDS Simmonscourt, which was minutes from our hotel and we could see the building from our room.  Seeing U2 were nominated we thought that if they were in town they might go so we decided to wander round.  Unlike The Brits last year there was nowhere that fans could stand to watch stars arrive and we just wandered aimlessly for a while.  The ticketholders were arriving and they were very young, so much so that I felt very out of place!  After a short while we decided to go back to Bewley's and have a meal and then opened our champagne. 

Later that evening the Meteors finished and it seemed the VIP cars left on a road right outside our window.  We sat there having a great laugh (whilst supping our Veuve), at some very boisterous young girls hanging onto and running after various cars!  We later found out that Adam had been at the event to present the Industry Award to Lord Henry Mount Charles.  U2 won none of the awards they were up for though they were hotly tipped to take home all three!  Is Ireland's secret love affair with U2 over?

On our last full day Debbi and I did our own thing for a few hours during the day.  I went through to Dun Laoghaire to visit friends Ken and Elizabeth and had a lovely visit and it was nice to catch up on their news.

That evening we went to The Town Bar and Grill in central Dublin for our meal.  We've been there a few times now and it is always fabulous, it is expensive, but we save money every month for our trips and so it doesn't hit the pocket as hard as it could!  I decided to be adventurous and had a starter I'd never had before, wood pidgeon and chestnut lasagne.  The wood pigeon was lovely, but I now know I don't care for chestnuts!  I had tiramisu for dessert and it was the nicest I've ever had, absolutely delicious. 

It was a great way to end our short trip to Dublin.  Over the years we've seen all the sights etc, so a big part of our trips now is to eat really well and wash it down with lovely wine, something we both love doing.  Along with the company of a good friend it's a great way to spend time in Dublin!