Drinking in Dublin

We arrived in Dublin this morning. The flight was bumpy and uncomfortable, but we got here and that's all that matters.
Dublin airport has thousands, maybe millions, of people traveling through it daily. That is why I was very surprised when we got there to see an older building, where it was apparent no one had planned to have that many people go through it each day.
We went to our hostel, dropped off our stuff and went on our way to explore Dublin. I was not impressed at all with the city. We walked around quite a bit, and saw a lot of graffiti, run-down buildings and the smell of pee mixed with the trash odor in parts of the city.
We went to DVBLINIA, a viking museum here. The museum gave a brief historical background of Dublin, starting with the vikings, continuing through the Middle Ages. What I found most interesting was the history of Dublin and how the Vikings settled the area. Originally, the name of the area was Ath Cliath. There was a monastery named Duiblinn, meaning "black pool," in reference to a pool of water by Dublin Castle. The museum was interactive too, so we got to play with some of the props, such as the chain mail head armor.

We also saw The Spire, a huge pole in the middle O'Connell Street. It is the tallest structure in Dublin. It's basically a tall flagpole, but it was made to memorialize a statue that was blown up in 1966.
Overall, the morning and early afternoon was unimpressive. However, after a short nap, Dustin and I headed over to the Guinness Storehouse. The air smelled like sweet beer or marshmallows or steak, depending on who you asked.

We snuck into the museum and the gravity bar, and then we were kicked out of the gravity bar because we didn't have tickets (We arrived too late to buy tickets). But, I did manage to sneak a few pictures in before we were thrown out.

We walked to the Temple Bar after that, and we went to The Porterhouse Brewery for dinner. We had the best fish and chips ever, accompanied by some tasty Temple Brau (pronounced brew) and Fruli beers. There was an amazing music group playing at the restaurant too. The restaurant was the most enjoyable thing we did, in my opinion, so far. There is no way to really express how much fun and wonderful the atmosphere was at The Porterhouse Brewery.
In Temple Bar, we saw some great street acts such as the living statue dressed as a skeleton. He would jump on his box as people gave him euros, scaring the people who were watching him. There was also this great street band, who had the crowd basically blocking the street.

Overall, the evening made the trip to Dublin worth it.