Dublin

On Monday we sailed from Arklow to Dun Laoghaire (pronounced Dun Leary) after an 06:00 start into our, by now customary, northerly headwinds.  However, this time, we had the benefit of strong north-going tides to help us and we just made it to our destination as the wind died on us and the tide started to turn south - phew!  But is was COLD!  I don't call this nearly Summer.

This is a photo of us taken from the fellow yacht "Cartel" but we are very small on the horizon ahead of them.  

We stayed put for Tuesday as the forecast was for gale force winds and in any case we thought we ought to make a visit to Dublin to learn more about the Republic of Ireland and especially how it came to be set up last century.

So we took the train into Dublin and, being used to early starts from our sailing trips, were surprised to find ourselves with standing room only amongst the commuters on the train at 08:00.  We had thought this was rather a late start but of course it put us right into the middle of the city rush hour :)

We had a look round the sights and then made our way to the Dublin General Post Office on O'Connell Street.

The tall stainless steel spire in this photo is called the Monument of Light and it replaced Nelson's Pillar after that was blown up by the IRA (Irish Republican Army) in 1966.  It commemorates the Easter Rising in 1916, when Irish revolutionaries tried to force the British to allow Ireland to become a free and independent country.  A relatively small number of revolutionaries took over the General Post Office as their HQ and then proceeded to attack the (very unprepared) British soldiers. They even blew up their ammunition store!  I don't think many people expected them to succeed and the British later took back control of the city and defeated the Irish fighters.  But the short uprising and the subsequent very insensitive actions by the British government started a process that would eventually give the Irish their independence.  It turned the Irish people's sympathies away from the British and hardened their attitudes so that only full independence would do.  The Irish Free State was created on 6 December 1922.  Some people in the north of Ireland, who remained loyal to Britain, were allowed to remain as part of the UK.
We visited the very informative and rather sobering exhibition at the General Post Office to see what a pivotal part this played in the recent history of Ireland.  Repercussions from the Easter Rising still affect both Ireland and Britain to this day.