Iceland Cruise July 12th 2017 - Dublin Page

Another beautiful day. We have done Dublin twice before, in Summer on this link and Winter on this link. It was time we left town & went into the countryside, to the noted Powerscourt Gardens.

Dublin traffic is much worse than London & it seemed to take forever to get out. This place is just in Wicklow County, opposite the Sugar Loaf Mountain. Below the terrace behind the house, a stairway goes down to a fountain & pond feature. This is no wild garden, being attended immaculately, with Nature strictly under control. We walked off the right-hand end of the terrace, finding some peculiar large shrubs/small trees & then, a tower. This had a spiral staircase but the view was restricted by trees from the top.

We used the excellent café in the house, which is part of the up-market shopping mall the house now is & not part of the gardens, a strange arrangement caused by the high price of the garden tickets. Then, as the stair to the fountain is rather precipitous & not Avis-credible, we went through the flat Walled Garden to the Dolfin Pond & back between the Walled Garden & the steep slope rowards the staircase. On the trip back, the native guide, who was half-German & half-Swedish with an Irish accent overlaying that melange, made us sing "Molly Malone" & "The Wild Rover".