Day 4

We spent the day in Dublin. The morning started with a guided tour where we saw St. Patrick's Cathedral, the Guinness factory, Trinity College, several government buildings, a hotel owned by U2 (the band), Phoenix Park and tons of statues and monuments that I do not remember (I need to pay better attention). At the end of the tour we went back to Trinity College to see the Book of Kells exibit.
The Book of Kells is a latin manuscript of the four gospels. It was transcribed by Celtic monks sometime during the 9th century in a monastery on the island of Iona. The book is lavishly decorated with intricate drawings and gold and other metal inlay (very pretty). It was given to Trinity College in the late 1600's.
We also took a visit to Kristina's heaven. Trinity College houses one of the world's best research libraries. It holds the largest collection of books and manuscripts in Ireland, and due to some old copyright law, has access to one free copy of everything published in Ireland and Britain. The library is housed in eight buildings and has nearly 3 million volumes. The area of particular interest is called the long room, which is the oldest part of the libary (circa 1700) and houses the library's oldest books. The room is amazing and looks like it did when it was built over 300 years ago. Kristina, it probably could make you cry :)
After Trinity College, we ate lunch and had about 6 hours of free time to explore the city. Dublin is pretty cool looking and the shopping is awesome. I got some pretty amazing stuff and Kyle bought wiskey (shocker). We had dinner at the hotel and I am going to try to get to bed early since we have to leave at 6:15 to catch the morning ferry to Holyhead, Wales. Might not have internet tomorrow, but will for sure have it on Wednesday in London.