We took a guided walking tour of the 1916 Easter Uprising sights. It was lead by a lecturer at Trinity College who had just released a book on the subject (but who lectures in Crusades). I found it very interesting and had I still been teaching the topic at school it would have been very relevant as well. There are plenty of the important locations still to be seen: Trinity College, where Aussie troops joined the Brits in shooting up the rebels; St Stephens Green where Brit artillery was set up after rebels were forced off it; The GPO which still has bullet or shrapnel marks in its columns; Abbey Rd, the rebel start point; and so on. We also saw some later points of interest, such as the Brit intelligence HQ where Michael Collins managed to arrange a night reading all the files, including his own. All in all, well worth the money.
We had a quick flick through the shops after that (I think - it's all a bit hazy after so many days) before jumping on a train as far as it would go around Dublin Bay. There were some decent views and we had a walk in Bray where the train finished up. It was still raining off and on so it was a short walk. We decided to have dinner there and found a nice restaurant. J made friends with the baby at the next table so we had a chat with those people before heading home.
The train passes by the old Lansdowne Road grounds which are currently being bulldozed. The game has moved to the new Croke Park stadium which replaced the old ground where (if memory serves me right) the Black and Tans machine-gunned the crowd during the Troubles. (Please excuse the quality of the pic, which was taken from a moving train.)
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