The Guinness is Better in Dublin

I knew I wanted to go by train to Ireland. The friend who I travelled with didn’t like boats, ferries and trains but I showed her the good reviews of the train journey from London Euston to Holyhead and she was won over. 

At 12:10 we departed from London Euston with a Virgin Trains service. The journey has one change en route, which is in Chester near the Welsh border. From Chester, you change on the Arriva Trains Wales service to Holyhead. Although my previous experiences with Virgin Trains weren’t that good, this time we had the ‘Voyager’ train, which had bigger windows. I was worried about the arrival time of the train (because there are many delays) and meeting our connection on to the Arriva Trains Wales service. We did arrive on time, but the train from Chester to Holyhead was 15 minutes delayed. The waiting time rewarded us with some magnificent views of the Welsh highlands and coast. I recommend making a seat reservation because some people didn’t and they were standing for nearly two hours!!! I couldn’t believe that the seaside was just 5 metres away from the rail line. It was a great experience. Halfway along, we went through a tunnel and before we went in, we caught a glimpse of the castle called Conway. After a lot of stations, we approached a very famous one. The station has the second-longest name in the world (the longest is in New Zealand). The place is called Llanfair......gogodoch was the easiest part of the name I could remember. The highlights of the Welsh scenery were the highlands, coast and of course the sheep. We took the Irish Ferry to Dublin. First I thought that we went with the Ulysses, but it wasn’t the 66-ton ferry, but the swift ferry which was... Okay... fair enough... I couldn’t compare it with the Stenaline ferry Harwich – Hook of Holland (where I come from). The swift ferry was too small to compare. After our two-hour ferry journey from Holyhead, we arrived in Dublin. It took seven hours altogether, but now I can say that this train journey is an amazing experience. From Dublin port it was only 2 euros for a transfer bus to the city centre. We walked from the bus station to Trinity College (where we stayed for the weekend). After we put the luggage in our room we went for a nice beer in Fleet Street (known as the Temple Bar district). The atmosphere was really good and I recognised that the Irish people really like beer. The other days I spend some time on the traditional and famous Dublin sights. I went to the Guinness Storehouse which I recommend visiting (the Guinness is definitely better than in England). During the weekend there was also a huge sail event which I visited. Because I stayed in the Trinity College I was wondering what the history was of this university/college, so I took a tour, which was 30 minutes long. Afterwards, we saw the Book of Kells. All of the books in the library are sorted by size instead of the subject. The library has 200.000 books, but nowadays it’s just a tourist attraction. On the last day we took the bus to Kilmainham Gaol which is well worth a visit. It’s an old jail with a bad history (for the prisoners). Afterwards, we walked to Dublin Heuston station and took the airport shuttle bus to the airport. We flew back with Aer Lingus to London Heathrow. The duration of the flight was only 50 minutes and we had some very nice views over London.