We arrived in Dublin late night and it definitely came in handy that I knew my way around already. Not much worse than having to search your way to your designated bed when you’re tired… We checked in to our Hostel on the Southside, that I picked mostly because of the good location close to some of my facourite places to eat and some others that I wanted to try.

In the morning we buckled up and walked down Camden Street, full with normal people doing their business or heading to work or university, and made our way to The Cake Cafe. After buttermilk pancakes with bacon, citrus curd and banana with a view of the beautiful courtyard, we made our way back towards the hostel, but not without another coffee stop to check out Meet me in the morning along the way.

When we left the hostel to get to the free walking tour, my friend noticed a poster advertising the musical ‘Once‘ playing in a theater around town from July til August. On the way to the start point of the tour we got all excited and both wanted to go. Luckily the ticket website was wonky, it didn’t let her book tickets, what was frustrating at that moment but in retrospective saved us quite some bucks.

Free walking tour through Dublin

We took an almost 3 hours long tour with Sandemans New Dublin Tours and our very knowledgeable guide John finally gave us the inspiration for our travel hashtag. He not only educated us about the origins of the Leprechaun myths (before the tall Celts arrived in Ireland the inhabitants were really short and digged for gold) but also explained how it is possible that Ireland actually is the golden island of Atlantis according to the storyfacts that Plato stated. We also learned some Irish words like ‘craic’ (fun) and how to great other people in Irish. You can see us practise live in my instagram story… So there it was, our Hashtag: #craicinatlantis

As we moved through Dublin Castle I couldn’t help but be a smartass when our guide asked about what is wronh about the Lady Justice that sits on one of the gates (which is currently under construction). Apart from the fact that she is not wearing a blindfold, her sword is drawn and the scale is lower than the sword. And the last thing wrong is that the statue is facing inwards to the castle (where there was spoken justice but only for a small group of the citizens who had enough money, the right belief and language). That altogether resulted in the statues nickname “Lady Injustice” and as Ireland is the country of Writers and Poets, it also comes with a rhyme: Lady Justice knows her station, face to the castle and ass to the nation.

I like those little rhymes and sentences that describe things or facts around here. There are a lot of wise proverbs along with hilarious descriptions of things (e.g. the tart with the cart to describe the Molly Malone Statue).

We walked over to Christchurch Cathedral where we heard about the reasons why the cathedral was built and made our way to Temple Bar from there to hear about great Irish actors, origins of famous Irish band U2 and the greatest guitar player of all, Rory Gallagher.

The tour closed in Trinity College, where we were told about all the famous alumnis, the buildings and of course the Book of Kells and the famous Long Room of the library. The one thing that left me baffled was that in a group of around 20 people I seemed to be the only one who had seen Star Wars and remembered the Jedi archives, which was a rather ‘illegal’ digital reconstruction of this very library.

#Onceindublin

Next up we went straight for the box office of Olypia Theatre to get ourselves musical tickets. We were stopped in the kindest way by one of the promoters in front of the theatre who highly recommended the show, gave us some discount vouchers and chatted us up. After we got our tickets (and were really excited), it was time to buy some new shoes and accessories, because #onceindublin called for dolling up.

After a nice Sambo for dinner on Dame St we arrived early at the theatre cause we are German after all. It’s good to be at the show early, cause there is an onstage bar where you can buy yourself a drink and get some real stage feel. Plus ahead of the show the actors come out and play a few songs while people are still on stage with their drinks, which is fun to watch. The musical itself was wonderful, very good music, a lot of jokes cracked and the whole plot brilliantly played in a single scenery.

After the show we took an obligatory nightstroll through Temple Bar with all the stag and hen parties and happily fell into bed after a long and exciting first day in Dublin.

Just for the record, this is my summer vacation, I pay for the trip and all the things I do around here. All mentions are honorable.

Read more about craic in Atlantis: Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6 | Day 7 | Day 8 | Day 9