July 9-10, 2024

July 9-10, 2024

We are up early to finish packing before our driver arrives who shuttles us to the Phoenix airport. Our first flight to Chicago is delayed, as is our second overseas leg. That is the new normal for travel today. However, we are thankful our Aer Lingus flight even takes off. Their pilots are striking for higher pay causing the airline to cancel lots of flights.

Not unexpectedly we arrive in Dublin to rainy weather. We dig out our rain coats and take a taxi to our hotel. This trip to Ireland is a replacement for the 2020 one that Covid cancelled. Aimee’s Irish mother would have approved.

After an hour nap and a couple cups of coffee, we are out the door for a walk. We know we need to get our body clocks reoriented. Across the street is the park-like grounds of the former Royal Hospital. From the small history exhibit we learn this facility was really a military retirement home similar to the one in Washington DC. The building now houses a modern Art museum. The art installations do nothing for me.

Also next door is Kilmainham Gaol. We signed up for a tour almost a month ago. We start in the disorganized museum. The gaol started life as a normal prison; normal that is for the Victorian era. Heat was non-existent, food scarce, and the clientele, both men and women, spanned all ages. The youngest was an unbelievable three-years-old, convicted of begging (vagrancy). The gaol was designed for 1500 prisoners but swelled to six times that during the Great Famine, when people decided going to prison beat starving to death. It reminds me of WWI where we learned men joined the Army just to get new shoes and a reliable meal.

At our appointed time we met our docent for a guided tour. It was excellent. We started in the old section of rows of dark cells, before moving into the ‘modern’ section that was well-lit and in the round so guards could more easily observe prisoners. The prison became infamous and an Irish national monument in the 20th century when it went from housing ‘criminals’ to political prisoners. When fourteen leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising were executed by firing squad here, it lit a public storm that resulted in open rebellion, English capitulation, and the creation of the Irish Free State a few years later.

After the tour we went across the street to a Pub for a burger and Guinness dinner.