24 Hours in Dublin - Solo
In March 2018, I had the opportunity to go to Amsterdam, The Hague, and Cologne with one of my best friends and her family. I found a cheap flight from Nashville to Dublin so I bought that and decided to get a ryan air flight to Amsterdam and meet them there. This gave me a great opportunity to dip my toe into solo traveling, since I’d be in Dublin on the back end of the trip by myself. I’m glad it was an english speaking country, and one that loves guinness as much as me. This trip was one of the most difficult, but incredible learning experiences, that I’ve been on to date. I only had 24-ish hours in Dublin and had to be up at the airport really early the next morning, so I did'n’t do a ton, but I feel like I saw the highlights :)
List of things to do in the post:
Kilmainham Gaol
Stay at Hilton Dublin
Temple Bar District
St. Patrick’s Cathedral
Get lunch at the Old Mill and get the beef stew
Kilmainham Gaol
Trinity College
Temple Bar
Guinness
Temple Bar again :)
Things I wish I had seen:
Blarney Stone
Cliffs of Moher
Dublinia (viking museum)
St. Stephen’s Green
I stayed at the Hilton Dublin and LOVED it! My luggage was lost at the beginning of the trip and they wouldn’t have been able to send it to me in time wherever I was, so they sent it to the Hilton Dublin and they held it for me for 3 days until I checked in. I cannot tell you how excited I was to see my luggage again!!! It was maybe 20 minutes from the airport and about 10 minutes from Temple Bar district. They upgraded me to a king room (I think because they felt bad about the luggage catastrophe) and were so kind.
I slept in a bit and got breakfast at the hotel, and was shocked seeing beans on almost everyone’s plates lol. I hate beans, and the idea of having them for breakfast seems wayyyy too much for me! I immediately went to the temple bar district, but drove by St. Patrick’s Cathedral. I walked around Temple Bar District for a bit. It was the week before St. Patrick’s Day so I enjoyed seeing everything and everyone get ready for the celebration.
I had lunch at the Old Mill and I’m sure it’s very touristy, but dang it was so good. It was a tiny space, but I got O’Hara beer, cheesy garlic bread, and beef stew…. to this day that beef stew is one of the best meals in my life…
Kilmainham Gaol
After lunch, I went to my tour at Kilmainham Gaol. Kilmainham Gaol (pronounced kill-main-am jail) is a former prison where Irish rebels were held and executed during the 1916 Easter Rising. It was very drafty and cold and made me feel for the prisoners who must’ve been freezing there! The tour is about an hour and a half long and the ticket price is only about $9USD. This was a surprisingly incredible tour and was one of my favorite things about Dublin.
After Kilmainham Gaol, I was dropped off at Trinity College so I could see their Library. It was closed the day I visited due to the students protesting. However, I heard 2 girls walking behind me and talking in an American accent, so I begged them to be my friends for the day lol. We walked to the cafe on the campus together and ended up heading to Temple Bar together.
We had a BLAST at Temple Bar. I had way too many guinnesses and encouraged my new friends to try it and they ended up enjoying it (gotta convert as many as I can!) We realized we all had tours at the Guinness Storehouse at the same time. So we left Temple Bar and headed to Guinness!
Trinity College
The Guinness Storehouse was my mecca. It is 7 floors of allllll Guinness and finishing at the top with a bar with panoramic views of Dublin. For the basic tour, it is around $20USD, however they have many options for a variety of tours such as the connoisseur experience, which is a 90 minute tasting in their “Secret bar.” I regret not doing the connoisseur experience, but the general tour was still amazing. I ended up buying a $120USD guinness hockey jersey…. (I don’t watch hockey…) Here are some cool things I learned:
a pint of guinness is only 126 calories! One of the lowest calorie beers on the market.
the company leased the dublin brewery for 9000 years and included free water access
it takes 119.5 seconds to pour a proper pint of guinness
guinness is nitrogen based, instead of carbon based - so it doesn’t bloat you like other beers
the guinness cans have a small “widget” in them to make the beer taste like it’s a fresh pour every time.
After guinness storehouse, we went to The Brazen Head, which is the oldest pub in Dublin. IT dates back to 1198 and is really cool to see. They have some really good food (the best mashed potatoes I’ve ever had) and some great fish n chips. After The Brazen Head, we went back to temple bar and it was PACKED! We didn’t realize that there was a rugby championship game between scotland and ireland that weekend, so we ran into lots of kilts. We listened to the band, drank lots of guinness, and had such a great time together. I ended my night around 11 and dragged my tipsy ass back to the hotel and went to sleep.
Dublin is a GREAT destination for a solo trip if you’re nervous for the first time. The people are friendly, the food is great, the beer flows, and they love to party.