Monday, October 26, 2009

Bull & Castle, and the Guinness Storehouse

Yesterday: Dublin



The Guinness Storehouse is a good mile and a half from St. Stephens Green (according to the tourist signs which I was dumb enough to follow). Fortunately we came across the Bull & Castle about halfway there.





Bull & Castle Pub, 5/7 Lord Edward Street, Dublin



We learned that the Bull & Castle is Dublin's best pub for craft beer selection. It's where the local beer geeks hang out, and the homebrew club holds its meetings upstairs.




Carlow Goods Store



Whitewater Belfast Black


Whitewater Belfast Blonde




Any football fans out there who can explain to me the meaning of the pint glass in the lower right corner of the screen? I've seen it on at least two networks.



There's lots more to try here, so I'm sure I'll be back.



The sun was actually shining today, so the rest of the walk was quite pleasant. The Guinness Storehouse is their tourist facility; they don't do actual brewery tours anymore. It's set up on seven levels in the old fermentation building, and the self-guided tour shows a fair bit of the history of the company and its equipment.




The Guinness Storehouse, St James's Gate, Dublin




Floor plan of the Guinness Storehouse. Note the pint-glass shape of the atrium.




This is what it's like inside a freshly-poured Guinness.




"The world drinks over 10,000,000 glasses of Guinness every day."




An old 600-barrel kettle




Our own Porter brewster poses with a quote from Arthur Guinness



The tour ends on the top level with a free pint at the Gravity Bar.




The Gravity Bar atop the Guinness Storehouse




The Guinness tank farm as seen from above



All in all it was interesting for the average tourist, but We Who Chase Beer might find it a bit lacking.



The rain had started again, and we opted for a taxi to take us back to the Luas stop.



Tomorrow: Meeting John Duffy

2 comments:

Goldberg said...

Nice blog! I went to Dublin for my honeymoon (with my wife). I recently posted a blog on the Guinness Storehouse tour as well. Check it out at http://www.diyeinstein.com

Just look for it in the blog archive!

Thanks

Anonymous said...

the pint symbol means the bar have paid for the correct pay TV subscription for a public house.

(its more expensive than a standard home subscription)