"Rain?" someone asked.
"Yes, Dublin does get a lot of rain, and the trees love all that rain," she answered, which made me think she didn't know much about Oregon's environment.
But the real answer was dead monks.
"There are 400 monks buried here in the quad," she told us. "Which makes for very rich soil."
The quad used to be a cemetery for the monks, but in Ireland, you can reclaim the land after 400 years. (Makes sense on a small island with a constant population.) Which is how the monk cemetery became the campus' main quad, complete with "Keep off the grass" signs.
That kind of freaked us out a bit, but explained the signs. (I was okay once I found out they were out of respect, and not just a snarky way to keep students from enjoying the beautiful grounds.)
The guide also described the dorms behind the quad, and how unlucky it was to live there.
"There's no heat in that building," she said, as we all gasped, because that seems downright cruel during an Irish winter! (We had on fleece jackets in mid-summer--I could only imagine how cold winter is!) She also pointed out a bright blue exterior door.
"And that's the bathroom," she explained. "Accessible only from outside the building. That's right, if you want to shower, you must leave the building and enter the bathroom from outside."
That also seemed cruel on a cold, wintry night! (Or any night, actually.)
There was one last reason to live elsewhere--the building was haunted. Apparently, a curmudgeonly professor had once lived in the building, frequently yelling at students being loud outside (the original grumpy old man yelling at kids to get off his lawn!). In response, a couple inebriated students returned with shotguns to scare the professor, but wound up shooting and killing him instead. They were sons of wealthy men, so they didn't go to prison, although they were kicked out of school for breaking the window with the shotgun. The professor's spirit remained, haunting students to this day.
But ghosts and dead monks aside, there are some cool benefits of attending Trinity. If you pass all your second-year finals, tuition is free the last two years. They also have an amazing art loan program. As a student, you can borrow any piece of art that Trinity owns. Our guide told us of her friend who received a small Van Gogh, which hung inconspicuously on her dorm room wall for the school year. Way better than an unframed music poster, if you ask me!
Trinity College is also home to the Book of Kells and the Old Library. The Book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript, contains the Four Gospels, and was illustrated by monks in painstaking detail. It's the most famous artifact in Ireland and is quite beautiful.
It's also the reason so many tourists visit Trinity College. So after our tour ended, we dutifully stood in line to see the Book. This line was longer, but moved fairly quickly, and there was some good people-watching opportunities while we waited.
Just inside the building was a very detailed exhibit explaining the Book, and its illustrations. I'm sure there was lots of great info, but there were also lots of people, so Amber and I made an executive decision, and skipped right past it all.
The Book was displayed in a big cabinet. You walk up to it, wait your turn/jostle your way in, and then look down on it. The pages were adorned with gilded pages and fancy writing with very detailed illustrations. However, it was a very tiny space filled with lots of people, so we took a good look, and moved on.
We followed the signs to the next exhibit, the Old Library. The Book of Kells was cool, but the Old Library...man, that took my breath away! Literally.
The Library was a long, narrow room with high ceilings and floor-to-wall windows that lit the room in a soft, dusky light. The walls, railings, and ceiling were carved of rich dark wood, and bookshelves lined every possible space. Ladders rested against the shelves, to reach the books at the very tippy-top. It all felt regal, mysterious, commanding quiet respect and hushed voices. It felt like we'd just stepped inside the Hogwarts library.
The room was massive, yet warm and inviting, comforting; I wanted to live there, among the books and ethereal light, and spend the rest of my days reading.
Amber and I spent a long time in there, slowly moving forward from the back of the library. We sat on the benches, pondering the room, and all the books. At the very front, on the second floor, we could see a man at a desk hard at work under a bright lamp. He was restoring the old books, cleaning their covers and preserving the pages. He worked at a furious pace, completely oblivious to the crowds below him.
Honestly, we could've stayed there all day, but we had a full schedule and only a few days to see it all. Reluctantly, we bid the library farewell, and went on to the next activity.
Which was...ice cream! And not just any old ice cream, but Murphy's ice cream! My friend Mary Ann insisted we go to as many Murphy's as we could (there are three), and swore we'd thank her forever after. We certainly did.
One of the other Trinity guides directed us toward Murphy's and told us to try a really unusual flavor--salt! He said it paired amazingly well with other traditional flavors, such as chocolate or caramel. We didn't get that creative, opting instead to go with our adorable server's suggestion--a Caramel Mingle, with honeycomb and butterscotch ice cream, butterscotch sauce, and a salted caramel cream.
Un. Be. Lieve. Able!!!! And soooooo good. Mary Ann definitely steered us in the right on Murphy's!
With a good sugar buzz going, Amber and I walked toward Dublin Castle and the Chester Beatty Library (yes, it was a library kind of day). We wandered around the giant maze on the lawn, and photographed the gorgeous garden.
Chester Beatty is on the castle grounds, so we started there. All the guidebooks said it is an amazing museum, possibly the best in all of Europe. We climbed the stairs to the second floor, and as we approached, the double doors slid open automatically, giving us quite a grand entrance.
"Ahhhhhhhh!" I sang, arms wide open, waiting for angels to appear. Yeah, it was that kind of moment!
A lady sitting on a nearby bench giggled at us.
"It's spectacular," she said, nodding toward the exhibit. "You're going to LOVE it. It will change your life."
And so we entered, all big expectations and excitement. But what we found was a little disappointing. I mean, the artwork was great and all, but it was our second day in Ireland, and we were falling seriously in love with everything Irish--the people, the music, the ice cream, the brogues, the sights. And then suddenly--180 degree turn--we're smack dab in the middle of a whole museum filled with Asian art. Which was very nice, even downright gorgeous, but...our mindset was stuck on Ireland right then, not Asia or the Middle East.
"I'm okay leaving after this," Amber whispered to me 15 minutes in.
"Me too," I said, gratefully. "Except...we have to make sure that lady is gone first!"
This exhibit changed her life...we couldn't possible exit past her so quickly! Luckily, when we peeked out the door, she was gone.
We ambled over to Dublin Castle next, stopping to take about a trillion photos of the chapel. Just as we were walking past the front door, a tour appeared. The guide unlocked the door, ushering them in, and I nudged Amber.
"Let's go!" I said, curious to see inside.
It was equally gorgeous on the inside. We sat in the back, admiring the ornate pews and fancy ceilings, as the guide told us all about the chapel. The tourists all around us spoke German, so I was just thankful the guide did not.
We left with the tour group, and headed up toward the castle courtyard and front entrance. It was jammed with people. Amber and I decided to skip the tour and focus on something more important--lunch at the Hairy Lemon. It was every bit as good as the name was silly.
Then it was back to sightseeing! We boarded our personal limo (the HOHO bus) and returned to the Guinness Storehouse. We'd only made it through the first two floors yesterday, so we started on the third floor, which had a great exhibit of Guinness ads. We took a million goofy photos, except in the digital photo booth--we were too short for the camera! (Apparently, everything in Ireland was built by tall men with no regard for short women. We found this with all the bar tables, bathroom mirrors, sinks, etc. I was too short to reach anything--including the floor from my bar stools!--in Ireland.)
Each trip to the Storehouse comes with a free pint, which we sampled yesterday in the Gravity Bar. Today, we worked for our beer. Amber and I attended the Guinness Academy, where we learned to pull the perfect pint. So if you ever have a party (and a keg of Guinness), you should definitely invite Amber and I, as we're certified in the art of pulling pints.
We spent so much time at the Storehouse that we had to cab it back to the hotel for our next activity--dinner with Amber's Irish friend Eimear!
Eimear was great. She and Amber hadn't seen each other since college, but fell easily into catching up. We strolled the streets of Dublin in search of dinner, and Eimear was clearly feeling a lot of pressure to pick just the right place.
"Where would you go with your friends?" Amber asked. "If you all met up for dinner, where would you eat?"
That immediately took the pressure off. "Oh!" Eimear said. "This place is really good."
And that's how we ended up in an Italian restaurant for dinner. With an Irish girl. Who ordered a hamburger. ;-) (They also had fish and chips on the menu!)
"I don't like Irish food," Eimear admitted later. "Or Guinness."
"What!" Amber and I cried. But hey, I'm half Mexican and don't like Mexican food, so who am I to judge? I realized I'd found my European counterpart!
Dinner was great. We quizzed Eimear on everything Irish, and she was a good sport about it. Afterward, we strolled the streets of Dublin, walking Eimear to her bus stop. She told us stories about all the different shops and streets, and about Irish life. It was great to spend time with a local person, and learn about the country through her perspective.
We left Eimear at her stop, and walked toward our hotel. It was late, around 10:30, and we'd had a busy, busy day. We were a bit tired, but not sure we were ready for bed just yet. What I love about Amber is that, like me, she hates to miss out an anything. She doesn't want to miss a party, a sight, any place that seems interesting. It's why we had so much fun on our trip, and why we came back absolutely exhausted. Sometimes you need a person who says, "Enough! We need to rest!"
However, Amber and I are NOT those people! We only had one more day in Dublin, and we weren't going to miss anything. So we turned back into Temple Bar, found a pub with live music, and drank beer until they closed around midnight.
We'd only been in town about 36 hours, but man, we'd already seen a lot! And we still had more (much more!) to see...
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