phoenix park

lovely

 Hubby and I took a lovely walk heading east along the river today. Tomorrow is the last bank holiday before Christmas and the streets of the city centre were full of people. We decided to head away from the people and take a long walk. At the end we delivered some of the pumpkin muffins to our friends (yes we have friends!) who live in Stoneybatter. I just realized I've been saying "Stoneybanner" this whole time. Anywho, we went for our stroll and ended up over there for tea + biscuits, pizza for dinner, and some lovely conversation. We discussed trashy tv (Jersey Shore) in pop culture and whether it's inconsequential or negatively impacts society. We are so smart.

lifesaver strategically placed in case you fall into the Liffey

looking across the river at the Guinness Storehouse

building full of beer

the Irish love extra letters

hubby waiting for me to catch up

looking back at the entrance

a lovely pathway

These pictures are mostly taken in Phoenix Park, which is about a 30 minute walk from our building. You can read more about how awesome Phoenix Park is by clicking here. On our next trip I hope to find the walled garden that I just saw on that website. I hope we have some more autumn-type days before it gets too cold. We also found out where the Guinness Storehouse is by walking past it.

A fun fact about Dublin (maybe all of Ireland?) is that streets that stretch on for miles can have many different names. Almost every block you go past, the street's name will change. Dublin does not believe in street numbers so instead of navigating by counting, you know where something is located by the street name + building name. There can only be 3-5 buildings on one block so you can walk up the street looking at their entrances to see what the building name is. They all have stately sounding names: Jervis Place, Baileys Court, Castleforbes Square, Palace Gardens, Custom House, The Stockyard, Ha'penny House.

Example:
We live at Ha'penny House, Lower Ormond Quay--said "key". I wont say the apartment number since I might have blog stalkers.

As you walk along the quays--the streets right next to the river--the street has the following names for each of the blocks before hitting Phoenix Park: Upper Ormond Quay, Inns Quay, Arran Quay, Ellis Quay, and Wolf Tone Quay. Those are the northside quays and in my (American) mind they are all the same dang street. Quay is a fancy word for street similar to Drive or Boulevard except it means the street is by the river. On the southside of the river the quays have all different names. That way you dont have to say "south" when giving directions or say a street number along the road because the road is only one or two blocks long. Get it? Me neither.