Dun Laoghaire, Ireland (Dublin)

 This port was supposed to be a docking port, but a few days ago, Regent was informed that we were being bumped to anchor and tender.  Rumor is that cargo ships beat us out.  I guess it's understandable, but it was unfortunate.  We had a tour that was scheduled to meet at 8:00 am.  By the time all the formalities were done and the tender ride was over (30 minutes) we were late departing the port.  It's a good 30-40 minutes to central Dublin.  We had a bit of a drive-around tour of Dublin before getting to the Guinness Storehouse for the self-guided tour.  It is an amazing building that used to be the roasting and fermenting location, but that is now done somewhere else and mostly automated.  The whole brewery covers 5 acres of the city.  There is a lovely bar at the top with 360-degree views of the city.  It was a cloudy day, but great visibility which was fortunate.  Arthur Guinness signed a 9,000-year lease in 1759 for the location and access to the water from nearby mountains.  That lease is now embedded in the entry floor.  He bought it out a few years later.

Dublin has beautiful street lamps.

Some of the famous Dublin doors.

The lease from 1759

Guinness had their own boats built and their own trains

Getting back to the ship took considerably longer than the trip in.  Actually, nearly 3 hours due to traffic in Dublin, having to wait for a tender, and the 30-minute trip to the ship. We made one pass at getting hooked to the gangway, which failed. Since the ocean had gotten rougher over the day, the ship had to turn and the gangway moved to the other side so we could safely make the transfer from the tender.  We bobbed around in the water for 30 minutes waiting for all of that to happen.  By the time we got back on board, we had only about 15 minutes to change clothes and get back on a tender and a bus for a special event dinner that Regent had for Grand Arctic Voyagers back in Dublin.  We just couldn't face the very long trip back into Dublin and then back again to the ship, so we decided not to go.  I hope we don't regret it.  If we had had more time to "recover" from the day's tour, we probably would have gone.  I'm sure they wouldn't have scheduled this special dinner had they known it would end up being a tender port.

Apparently, Dublin has a new policy to limit cruise ships in the city dock, which means more will be going to Dun Laoghaire.  I wonder if that will be a costly decision.  We have friends on an Oceania cruise that had to miss Dublin earlier this month due to the weather.  If you have to tender, it can be a gamble as to whether you can get in.  We are here overnight, but we'll have to see what the weather is tomorrow before we go on our scheduled tour.

So back on board we had an adult beverage up in Galileo's just in time for afternoon tea.  It was a lovely selection of goodies, and since we had missed lunch, I had a chocolate scone with jam and clotted cream.  Nino came by and when we asked him where we should have dinner, he suggested he make reservations for us at Prime 7.  Done deal.  I joined the trivia team and we got third place again.  

Dinner was delicious, as always.  Missed the show again - nothing new.