Blake-Me, mom and Josh travelled to learn how to play 3 different Gaelic games. Halle chose to sleep in. The three Gaelic games were hurling, Gaelic football, and hand ball. We would be taught the culture behind the games and how much of an influence they were in Ireland. The professional players of Gaelic football and hurling didn’t get paid for paying. There were no contracts. What ever county you lived in was what team you played for. There was no trading or recruiting players from other counties. They would say to bring honor to their county and family name. The way they taught us how to play is they would teach us the rules then teach us some of the skills. The rules for hurling were you could only attack the ball if it wasn’t in some ones hand, you could take 4ish steps with the ball in your hand before you had to either pass it or balance it on your stick. Gaelic football was near the same rules but you could attack the ball whenever and you could bounce the ball after 4ish steps then you would either have to pass it or kick it back to yourself. Handball was just wall ball. They would teach us things like passes and holds and hits that would be mostly used. In both sports you couldn’t throw the ball you either had to hit it to your teammates with your foot, hand, or stick. Another cool thing about it was the scoring system. Each team had goalies that would stand in soccer goal sized goals but the top of the goal was field goal posts. If you got the ball through the field goal it was 1 point, if you got it in the goal pass the goalie it was 3 points. Gaelic games were said to be hosted for over 500 years I think. Overall it was really fun and us 3 had a great time.
That afternoon Rusty met us at the Grand Canal just in front of our apartment and we did an escape boat. How unique! It was really well done. Our quest was to radio for help, stop the flooding, and escape the boat. The clues and puzzles were really fun. And I’m proud to say, we escaped in 44 min. Go us!
Rusty–That night I met the kids and we took a cab to Temple Bar. This was a lot of fun. We somehow found a table and ordered food. Temple Bar is the most famous pub in Dublin. And Guinness is the most famous beer in Dublin and they have a Guinness 0.0 which is 0.0% alcohol so Tara and I decided to order one and that was quite the spectacle to the kids. Everyone had to try it. Blake proclaimed that it taste like burnt banana peels. He also said we never need to worry about him drinking beer. It’s too gross. Tara and Josh tried Oysters and got a big “meh.”
Josh needed a sleep in day. So our last morning in Dublin Halle, Blake and I went to get Açaí bowls at the fresh market across the street. I love this store! Huge salad bar, açaí, delicious donuts, great pastries. Blake went back to the apartment as soon as he realized Halle and I were off to another cathedral.
Halle–After breakfast we rode the bus to St Patrick’s cathedral. The stained glass was so pretty, and it was fun to read the history about the guy who’s the reason for the random holiday in March. There were also a lot of old flags hanging up for over 100 years to honor soldiers. We explored the cathedral gardens then headed over to St Stevens green.
It was full of so many plants and we saw a cute gazebo by a pond we were walking to when we saw a whole family of swans! They were gigantic with two adults and three babies. They were so cute and drew quite the crowd. The babies were so funny to watch walk on wobbly new legs, and I could have stayed all day. One guy had bread and the baby swans could just perfectly reach up to his hands and take it. It was adorable.
We saved the Archeological Museum for last. Because—BOG BODIES. These things are so creepy and cool. The conditions in the bog preserved these bodies in such a unique way. In one, they were able to ascertain what he ate the day he died! Photos taken from Google images.
Goodbye Dublin! It’s been fun!
