A Letter from Dublin

a cozy autumnal weekend in the lovely city of Dublin, Ireland.

This is a written version of my YouTube vlog to provide an alternate form of sharing my travel diaries. Whether you prefer the visuals, the words, or even both, I am grateful for your time.

Dear Reader,

It’s finally feeling like Fall, and I couldn’t think of a cozier place to spend a lovely autumnal weekend with friends. Welcome to Dublin.

This was my first time seeing Ireland. I didn’t make the trip while I was studying abroad in London, but I had always known I wanted to visit. Actually, growing up, my mom would go to Ireland frequently on work trips, so it’s been a place I’ve been fascinated by for quite a while.

We arrived on a Saturday morning and stayed until Tuesday midday. Autumn was in full swing the weekend we visited. The trees were beautiful shades of orange, gold, and red. We were actually really drawn to how red the ivy on some of the buildings was; it was so striking and pretty to look at. As we had arrived early in the morning, my friend Lylla and I had some time before her friend Emma arrived from England and our check-in time. We stumbled upon this cozy cafe to grab some coffee and headed over to a park we had seen in the cab over.

I want to speak for a second about our intentions, or I guess lack of, for this trip. I usually like to be very detailed in writing out what I want to do, what I want to see on a trip, to make sure I don’t miss anything. If you’ve seen some of my previous videos, I talk about itineraries and planning docs, and all that. And while there were definitely a few things I wanted to do for this trip, for the most part, we didn’t plan anything. And it was perfect. Going into random coffee shops, local pubs, and parks really helped me feel very present and led us to wonderful experiences. For example, when Emma arrived, we walked down to a nearby pub and had the best meal of the trip. It was this lovely roast chicken; everything about this meal was so perfect and just what we needed.

After a very long nap, we got ready for the night and headed into central Dublin. We passed by The Temple Bar, which is a very well-known spot in Dublin. It definitely lit up the streets with the amount of lights on the building, and it was fun to look at. For dinner and drinks, we went to the Bank, which was a stunning bar and restaurant in a former bank. The ceiling and decorations of the place were so intricate and beautiful, it made the experience really nice. They seated us pretty quickly despite not having a reservation, and I tried their soup of the day, which was a sweet potato and ginger soup. I have to say, we had some of the coziest meals on this trip. We ended the night dancing at a random pub we found on the way back that had live music. I didn’t document anything from that, but it was a fun memory from this trip.

One of the things we had actually talked about doing was a day trip to Howth. It’s a nearby seaside town that is known for its cliff walk. But before we head there, we decided to get a light breakfast at a place called Mister Magpie. Another side note, I was surprised by how many magpies there were. I’d never seen so many all at once, but they were all over the city. We took the train to Howth, which was very easy to get there; it was maybe about an hour on the train? And it drops you right by the Harbor area. The previous night, I’d seen that there was a market, so we decided to look around for a little bit before the walk. Found a lot of cute things, from the popular wool sheep keychains to knitwear to rings. It was a relatively small market, but we found a good amount of souvenirs there.

And now we begin our walk. There were a lot of people there, so it’s pretty easy to follow the crowd to get to the trail. There were also a bunch of signs with the different paths you could take. We went the green route since Lylla had done it previously. If you end up doing this, I would say you need to wear a good pair of shoes, but it’s not a huge hike. There are inclined moments and steps at some points, but nothing too intense. It’s definitely a long walk, nonetheless.

After the walk, we headed to the town center for brunch. It was nice to warm up with a cup of tea; it felt very cozy. We headed back to the main part of Dublin to walk around the city for a bit, as we had only really seen it at night the day prior. We went into St. Stephen’s Green, which was such a beautiful park. Kind of reminded me a lot of certain parts of Central Park around the Bow Bridge area. I truly feel like we came at the perfect time with how the trees looked.

Again, didn’t record the end of last night, but we ordered Indian food and watched Zoe Sugg vlogs for the rest of the night. Anyway, today was set to be our shopping day as we all love shopping. But we started with brunch at Eathos. Our next stop was Trinity College. All I could think about here was Normal People. I love that show, I immediately rewatched it when I got home from this trip. The other thing we had talked about doing was the Book of Kells experience, which was very surprising. I love a beautiful library, and this is definitely up there with one of my favorites I’ve seen. The overall experience was very well done. I liked the movie portions where they explained the history of the Book of Kells and the creation of the library.

None of us likes beer, but we felt it was only right to try a Guinness, so we ordered a half pint at a pub. We barely made a dent in it, but it just was not for us.

To end off the night, we went to this vintage cocktail club, which we stumbled across on our first night. You do need a reservation, but it was such an interesting experience. It has an intentionally unassuming exterior, but the inside is sooo gorgeous and cozy. It was a great way to end our final night in Dublin.

We ended with a quick breakfast at another nearby cafe before heading to the airport. I really had the best time on this trip with these girls. It was perfect for the fall time and a very peaceful place. Ireland is a gorgeous place, and I’m so happy I got to see Dublin. Thank you so much for reading, and I’ll write soon.

With Love,

Sof