Entrance to St. Stephen's Green
The research trip begins tomorrow, but some of the participants arrived today (always a good idea to give yourself a day to acclimate to the time change). Some of those who arrived early stopped by the Library to get the Reader's Tickets while waiting for their rooms, then crashed for a few hours. I spent the morning working on my lecture for the Past To Our Past Conference next weekend, and then went out for a walk.
I realized that I had never walked through St. Stephen's Green…I've walked around it in the past, but
today I went in. It is a 22 acre public park in the center of Dublin, just across from the top of Grafton Street, opened in 1880. It reminds me of the large parks in London. Today was a beautiful sunny day with the temperatures in the high 50s and masses of people were out strolling through the park, feeding the ducks and swans, and generally having a good time. The trees are starting to change reminding me of New England.
At 5:30 I met those who had arrived today and we headed for the Temple Bar area to have dinner at the Quay Restaurant. Dublin is a city where you can get any type of food, Thai, Mexican, Italian, Indian, but for a first night in Ireland, Guinness stew or fish and chips seemed to fit the bill. Tomorrow the rest of the group will arrive and we'll begin our research week.
