Dublin

We caught the 7 pm Ryanair flight to Dublin from Valencia. We had a little difficulty ordering an Uber in Dublin airport but finally arrived at the Gresham Hotel around 10pm local time. The hotel had been bought by the.Riu Family from Catalonia around 2009 and now had over 400 rooms. Our room, 608, suffered from the fact that the lift only went to the fifth floor and then there were some 20 stairs to climb with the heavy suitcases to get to our room. It also had a balcony that was locked to stop access. After getting the necessary things out of the small suitcase we hit the hay

The Gresham was a great disappointment, as it had been one of the iconic luxury hotels of Dublin in times past. Today it was a mass market, middle of the market, run of the mill hotel. It has a lot of history, including two murders on Bloody Sunday 1920

The bedroom corridors are so dark and unwelcoming the I forgot to take a photograph, and nobody on the web had posted on either


The Gresham is an old established hotel .	It has been taken over by a Spanish company, taken downmarket	but is very profitable for them	The cavernous main restaurant that serves breakfast

The Gresham's breakfast room left a lot to be desired, although the food was actually not too bad, the room itself was cavernous. dark without windows and overcrowded. We then went out for a 30 minute walk before returning to read for an hour in the pleasant lounge that fronted onto O'Connell Street We then packed up and left the luggage in their store well before noon.

Down O'Connell Street we went into what was once the Abbey Theatre, but now the Peacock Theatre, to try to book there for a play but there was nothing on the night of our return to Dublin in two weeks. From here we went next door into the wee Free church of David's great grandfather and saw the glass cube for offices that the insurance company had inserted without touching the original building.

So we walked further down O’Connell Street to Grafton Street where we found the "Build a Bear" shop and bought two T-shirts of Dublin for the boys. Close by we found the Gaiety Theatre and obtained tickets for River Dance for the evening of our Dublin stay on the completion of the cruise

Once back at the hotel, we collected our suitcases from their storage, and got an Uber to board the Silver Wind for its 14 night cruise to the north coast of Iceland. David had problems booking an Uber to the ship, but we still got to berth 18/3 soon after 2 pm and had an efficient booking in process.

We were impressed by our cabin, 643 which had obviously recently had a makeover and had a nice extra little space attached to it where the sofa fitted snuggly. It was right next to the forum where reception and the expedition team had their offices. It seemed more modern and slightly larger than what we were accustomed to on the Silver Cloud or the Silver Wind. We then enjoyed lunch at hot rocks having found that we could not sit outside on the Terrassa because they were already too many people there

After lunch, I unpacked while we watched the safety video and signed ourselves off for that. I went for a swim, very pleasant.and in the warm afternoon Dublin sunshine. Then a siesta until almost 6 when we went up to see the sail away: but the ship was late in this and it happened during the briefing which started at 6:15 pm. There was an introduction by the expedition leader, Werner from South Africa, and his team of 22 people The only one we really knew was Malcolm the Birdman from Australia, but we had also sailed with Alin (now the wife of Werner}. Mareika, Kaime nd Nico from Galapagos. Others included Ken, Josh, CK, Sasha, Jeremy the photographer.

We enjoyed a drink and canapés in the panorama lounge and had a chat with Florandy, the pianist. Both he and some of the bar staff remembered us because of the boys.We then returned to the cabin and we met the Butler, Kelvin. I unpacked quite quickly, everything fitting nicely in the wardrobe on hangers.

Then we went up to hot rocks about 8,30 for supper. We went to hot rocks Alias" the Grill " for dinner , only to discover that on the Wind the hot rocks have been discontinued: one waiter told us that this was because of health and safety, but the restaurant supervisor said that it was just out of order at the moment, We nevertheless still enjoyed our meal and then went up to the Panorama Lounge for a coffee, amaretto and brandy. There were 250 passengers on board and the ship did seem rather over full.


GPO on O'Connell Street	Interior of GPO	In Victorian times complete with Nelson's Column	In the aftermath of the Easter Rising in 1916

Wee Free Presbyterian Church in Abbey St	Interior of the Wee Free Church , now insurance company offices	Abbey Theatre from Abbey St	Abbey Theater front


	2 ADRIC were shot in Grafton St in 1921		And on board at North Wall soon after 14.00