A few years ago, I went to Ireland for work. We had a partner who was going to start selling our product, and I had to show their sales and support team how it all worked.
Our partner was located in Carlow, which is a smaller town in Ireland. I flew into Dublin and had a day there before I took the train to Carlow.

One of the first things I noticed in Dublin was the very helpful reminders on all street crossings for those who drive on the right side of the road.

I didn’t do too much in Dublin since my time was limited. I spent the day I had simply walking around downtown, mostly in the Temple Bar area. That being said, I of course managed to check out the Guinness Storehouse.

I paid for entry and went inside the pint-shaped building. No, the building itself was unfortunately not shaped like a pint glass; the outside was normally shaped, but the interior had an atrium-style opening going up the several floors that was wider at the bottom, narrowed about three-fourths of the way up, and then got wider again.

The entire ascent of the building takes one through the history of the company and the general production of the beer itself. Several exhibits such as the hops that are used, facts about the water, and difficulties and various successes about the company were all present.

Near the top, 12 of us that were visiting the storehouse got to take a “pint pouring” class. We were shown exactly how a pint of Guinness should be poured, and these were the results:

At the very top of the storehouse is a bar where you can get a free pint of Guinness (included in the entry cost).

The bar offered an excellent view of the city, although it was (unsurprisingly) a bit full. Nevertheless, one of the bartenders was a perfect Doppelganger of someone I know in Germany. I was joking with him about it, and he actually ended up giving me another beer (or two) for free. Thanks, Tobi’s Doppelganger!

After retiring for the evening and waking up early the following morning, I took the train to Carlow. I then spent the next couple days bringing their team up to speed.

I didn’t do much else in Carlow. Disappointingly, nobody there offered to take me out and show me the town or anything. I wandered around, but it was pretty small (population 24k) and didn’t offer too many attractions.

After my couple days of work were over, I then got back on the train and went to Dublin again, where I had one more night before my flight. I got into Dublin late, so I went to sleep and then again just wandered the streets the next morning.

Sometime in the afternoon I caught a bus back to the airport and flew back to Germany.

I liked Ireland, although I didn’t get to see much of it outside of work. My time was limited and I wasn’t able to explore Dublin, let alone the rest of Ireland, as much as I wished and it was unfortunately a little lackluster as a result. The Guinness Storehouse was certainly cool, though!

I would definitely like to make it back to Ireland someday.