Dublin, Ireland, November 2004
Following our first visit to Ireland in February 2004 we returned in November 2004 to explore Dublin and surrounds.
We pre-booked a hire-car again with Hertz through our airline Ryanair and picked up our little Ford Ka directly from Dublin Airport.
We stayed at the IMI Residence, 6 miles out of the city centre, because staying at a hotel in Dublin is ridiculously expensive. The IMI is actually a conference centre, but provides great accommodation to tourists as well at very reasonable prices. We were lucky enough to find a great deal on Lastminute.com which gave us 4 nights accommodation for £190, including breakfast.
While in Dublin we visited Temple Bar where we went for dinner on the Saturday night at Gallagher's Boxty House and again for lunch on the Tuesday.
We also went back to Mojo's Irish Music Store, to get more music when we were on our way out of Ireland on Tuesday afternoon. This time we bought a CD by the group Ragùs which features music from the Aran Islands on the west coast of Ireland.
For Yves' birthday on Monday night (22nd November), we went to a gorgeous French restaurant on Dame Street called Les Freres Jacques for a heavenly meal. We ordered an apéritif of porto with which we were given complimentary oysters cooked in their shell with a delicious topping that I think was Oysters Kilpatrick. Then the meal started with prawn bisque followed by crumbed calamari and salad. My main dish was venison en daube with vegetables and Yves had lamb and vegetables. We finished off with a trio of chocolate mouse and an expresso with complimentary chocolate petit fours. The service was impeccable, with graceful, professional French waiters who managed to turn table waiting into an art form which was a pleasure to witness.
