My final day in Ireland began with a delicious breakfast at a cafe called Rhubarb before I checked out of the Conrad. I stored my bags and set out for a final day of adventure.

I had hoped to meet my new Irish friend Jennifer at Christ Church Cathedral but my lack of wifi plus the Dublin bus schedule equaled missed opportunities. It’s a tragedy, but I’m certain I will see her on my next visit.

I got to the church very early so I stopped in The Queen of .tarts for a pot of tea. And a tart.

The church was magnificent. It was originally founded in 1028.

Without a doubt it was the most impressive cathedral I saw in Ireland.

I lit a candle for peace in Ireland.

There were a few really impressive monuments.

And the crypt!

Also in the crypt was a display of costumes from The Tudors. Much of the show was filmed in Ireland, and they used Christ Church for many key scenes.

The most interesting thing I saw was the cat chasing the mouse. When the cat chased the mouse into the organ they both got stuck and were eventually mummified.

Afterwards I walked to Temple Bar to grab a quick lunch. I was on my way to the national leprechaun museum, but I didn’t have a map and got turned around. Somehow I ended up at the Trinity College tourism office. They suggested I go to the National Museum instead, which was right around the corner.

The Ireland National Museum appears to be much like our Smithsonian, with different museums in different buildings. The one I was in was the museum of archaeology. It contained a lot of exhibits from Bog People, that is people who were found pretty well preserved in bogs.

The museum has lots of jewelry from the early Bronze Age.

And a very old Viking drinking horn.

And some medieval costumes worn by a “mannish woman” “wise enough to rule”!

There were early platform shoes…

And cowbells. Need more cowbells…

Afterwards I was starving so I popped into a sandwich shop and got a quick lunch and then walked to St. Stephens Green for a picnic. Most of the Dubliners had the same idea, it was hard to find an empty patch of grass!

I returned to the Conrad to pick up my bags and caught the Air Coach back to the airport. Then I took the Hilton Shuttle to the Airport Hilton for my final night. There isn’t a lot to do there, so I went down to the bar for dinner. I sat at the bar for my final Guinness and some Bangers and Mash. Several local boys came in and joined me. And we talked for a bit about their travels to the states.

After everyone else left, John stayed behind because the wife hadn’t finished making dinner yet and he apparently had some time to kill. John has a lovely 12-year-old daughter who is doing quite well in school. She’s doing particularly well in Gaelic but John was frustrated that she wasn’t learning French or Italian. He said that kids having to take Gaelic class made no sense to him since nobody outside of Ireland even speaks Gaelic and the Irish don’t even use it everyday so they forget whatever they learn as soon as they leave school. This was bad news for me, given my new neck tattoo!

We also had an interesting discussion about who was the greatest rock band of all time. I picked U2, John picked Thin Lizzy. I mocked his choice so he told me he was going to ride home, get some CDs and leave them for me at the front desk.

Later that night the front desk called to tell me John had left me some CDs.

I hate to leave… Irish people are the BEST!