Begin Your Trip With a HOHO

St. Patrick's Cathedral - Dublin

A great way to learn your way around a city and see an overview of the sights is to take a HOHO...and I don't mean a chocolate snack cake or Santa Claus. Hop-on/Hop-off bus  tours (commonly referred to as HOHOs) are offered in most major destination cities at a reasonable price and allow you to get on and off at designated points so you can visit some sights or stop for a beverage and bite to eat and then join the tour again at your leisure. Many of the buses are double decker and open top, which is especially nice in good weather.  Some insider tips...ask if the tour commentary is audio or live (live tend to be more informative and fun) and how often does the bus run/stop (every 15 minutes is good, so you don't have to wait to long if you barely "miss the bus").  The Dublin HOHO is the way we started our trip earlier this week...


Arrived very early Monday morning in Dublin and checked into O'Callaghan's Alexander Hotel. Nice hotel, friendly staff and in a great location. Walked two blocks to the nearest HOHO pickup and boarded the bus for the 1.5 hour loop. The bus is also great for inclement weather...unseasonably cool in Ireland and spitting snow when we arrived!  The loop took us past all of the major sites including St. Patrick's Cathedral, Trinity College, Christ Church, Guinness, St. Stephen's Green..just to name a few.

Our first stop was Upper O'Connell Street for a lunch at a traditional Irish pub (Murray's) where we enjoyed Irish Stew, Shepherd's Pie and Fish & Chips. A few in the group enjoyed a pint of Guinness, too! Next stop for a few of us was Jameson's Whiskey Distillery, where we took a great tour that ended with whiskey tasting, complete with certificates that we are now "qualified" whiskey tasters. Even if you aren't a whiskey drinker (I'm not), this was a fun and informative tou

Other sites some of the group visited:
Book of Kells at Trinity College - an illuminated manuscript Gospel book created by Celtic monks ca. 800.
St Patrick's Cathedral - a church has stood on this site since the 5th century. The current church was built in the early 13th century. The church contains many interesting stone tombs and some beautiful stained glass.

As most of us didn't sleep well on the plane over and had been awake for about 36 hours, we had an quick pub dinner at the Blarney Inn, followed by a dessert of sticky toffee pudding at the hotel (yummy!) and off to bed!

Stay tuned as we spend another day in Dublin!