One can safely state that the schedule that most tourists follow when in Dublin is quite predictable: they go to Temple Bar for a drink, take a photograph in front of Trinity College and perhaps go on a bus tour if they have the time. Although none of this is entirely incorrect, it only reaches the surface of a city which most definitely merits more than this.
Rather than follow the standard checklist of the highlights of Dublin, this guide explains the reasons why Dublin merits being explored in depth.
A City Built on Words
Few cities in the world take their literary history any more seriously than Dublin does. Not only did James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, Samuel Beckett and Bram Stoker all live in the city, but this heritage is embedded in the streets rather than being kept in one museum only. While the Dublin Writers Museum gives an overview of the subject, a more interesting account of the city’s literary history can be experienced by walking around: the route of Joyce’s Ulysses is plotted so accurately over the actual streets of Dublin that the city still holds celebrations of Bloomsday on June 16th, with followers re-tracing the path of the novel while dressing up in the period attire.
Because Trinity College’s Long Room library, which houses the Book of Kells, becomes crowded during midmorning, going there early before the tour buses turn up makes a real difference to the experience. It is worthwhile to Book a timed entry slot in advance via the college’s own visitor website before you arrive in Dublin rather than after, as the more popular slots are sold out several days in advance during the peak season.
Getting a Feel for Dublin’s Food Scene
The food offerings in Dublin have long outstripped the image of just serving Irish stew and soda bread, thanks to a real variety of modern Irish restaurants, international cuisine and casual bistros being located in areas such as Stoneybatter, Ranelagh and the Liberties. Since the more well-known restaurants get busy on weekends, it’s a good idea to look through the list of restaurants in Dublin a day or two before you go in order to get an idea of the different types of kitchens available before your appetite arises.
Where Locals Actually Drink
While Temple Bar attracts the largest number of people, if you ask a local where they actually go to have a pint you’ll most likely be given a different reply. The Liberties, one of the city’s oldest working-class districts, has gradually turned into a centre for smaller, independent pubs and craft breweries without giving up the well-worn atmosphere that originally made the area appealing. Stoneybatter, which is on the other side of the river, provides a comparable combination of traditional pubs and more modern bars without the price rise that is associated with the Temple Bar postcode.
It’s easier to end up at traditional music sessions than most tourists anticipate, especially on a midweek night when a pub with a small number of musicians in a corner doesn’t seem like a performance at all but rather something you happen to have walked into. The best of these sessions are seldom advertised anywhere, and getting advice from a barstaff member at a smaller pub about which nights tend to attract musicians usually yields a more helpful response than any entry online.
Getting the Georgian Architecture Right
One should truly take the time to slow down when visiting the Georgian squares of Dublin, rather than just taking photographs from a moving bus; the brightly coloured front doors which appear on every Dublin postcard have a local legend associated with them, according to some people having been painted by the residents so as to distinguish their houses after one or more drunk neighbours had gone into the wrong house, although historians are more doubtful of that tale than the tour guides are inclined to admit.
When to Actually Visit
April and September generally provide the most favourable combination of reasonable weather and fewer visitors, thus avoiding both the peak periods of July and August as well as the darker part of deep winter. Since the weather in Dublin is so unpredictable throughout the year, it is more important to bring a good raincoat than to choose a month that is officially the driest.
The Dublin Worth Coming Back For
Dublin gives visitors a good reception if they treat it not as a list of things to see but as a city which they actually take the time to spend in; the literary history, the pub districts and the Georgian streets all work better when visited at a slower pace than is usually possible within most weekend itineraries, and it is in this way that the city’s true character begins to emerge.