The Ham Nomads

26 Jun 2014. <IE> Dublin; Slane, Co. Meath —

Our last day in Dublin. We were going to leave first thing, but the weather was too good to waste. We went into town and went into the reading room of the National Library of Ireland. There's a beautiful ellipsoid dome, in shades of blue. Looked at the catalogue, and didn't recognise the format of the catalogue number, so went and asked what classification system was being used. The librarian, with some evidence of exasperation at the situation, said that they had used Dewey until some years ago, but now books are simply issued with an accession code, and are retrieved by that. I suppose that's okay if you have closed stacks (as is the case), but it makes it impossible to have those serendipidous discoveries you get by browsing the shelves, or computer browsing by call number, in a library with a good systematic classification system. Warren has been spoiled in working his whole library career in a library with good Library of Congress classification!

We spent some time in a Starbucks to let Warren catch up on the blog — we trust the time is well spent and all our friends and family in Oz are getting some feel of our travels! Thanks to all those people who have been making comments on the blog!

Henry Street & Spire

Fruit Vendor

GPO

We then went over to the north side of the Liffey to the pedestrian shopping areas of Mary Street / Henry Street / Earl Street North, which we had only sampled quickly yesterday because of the rain. This is a very lively shopping precinct, with buskers of an incredibly high standard, street vendors of fruits (using converted prams as their trolleys), people walking everywhere, and the whole overlooked by the Dublin Spire. We're glad we went back, as our first impression yesterday was of a wet and soggy place, not the lively place it really is!

Finally, we went back to the van and set off for points further north. Decided to set the Garmin to avoid tolls — there was one awkward section of the M50 around Dublin which has a toll, but the toll has to be paid in stores or online — this would have made for difficulty in our case, so we decided to avoid it. The Garmin took us on alternative roads, including the North Circular Road, and it took us within spitting distance of Kilmainham Gaol, so we knew where we were! We left Dublin on the N2, which took us up towards Slane (towards our ultimate destination of Derry).

Friary

When we got to Slane, we decided to pick up a few loose ends of our travels round the Boyne Valley. The statue of St Patrick on the Hill of Tara looks out towards the Hill of Slane, where St Patrick is traditionally said to have lit the Easter fire in 433, unwittingly disobeying King Laoghaire at Tara. The confrontation had a happy ending, however, as Laoghaire's druid, Erk, converted to Christianity (and later became the first Bishop of Slane), and the King was pacified. The Easter Fire is still lit each year on the Hill of Slane. So we went up to the Hill of Slane. The ruins of the Friary there date from 1512, so there is little connection with St Patrick — but it's rather nice just to visit the place!

We then went down to a car park Warren noticed on the way in to Slane, where the flat terrain will allow for a good night's sleep.

Distance driven — today, 40 miles ( 64 km ); to date, 3,154 miles ( 5,076 km )