The Many Ways to Tour Dublin...

Saturday, 30th July 2011

Pakdokter has learnt, from the many years of travelling, that the best way to tour a city is to walk the streets. The main tourist areas of Dublin - at they appeared on the map pakdokter took from the hotel reception - were all within walking distance from our hotel. And despite being in the height of summer, it was actually a very cold summer. Mornings were easily about 10 degrees celcius and on most afternoons the peak temperature was between 15 to 18 degrees celcius. This made it more easy to tour the city on foot.

As pakdokter walked the streets of Dublin - pakdokter could not help but notice the many different ways one could tour the city. The pictures below are self-explanatory.

These hop-on-hop-off bus are nowadays a common facility in most cities world-wide. Even our own capital-city, Kuala Lumpur, now has such a service in operation. It cost 17 Euros per person to take this bus tour which could be used over 2 days. Some of the tourist sites are located quite a distance away from the city centre and would be too far to be reached on foot - so this hop-on-hop-off bus would be a good choice. The buses travel on a fixed route with stops at locations of touristic interests. And there would be a bus coming around again to pick one up every 10 to 15 minutes. On the bus, there was a multi-lingual translation audiophones which keep you informed of the sites of interest. Otherwise if you understand English ( albeit with a heavy Irish accent and lots of Irish humour!) it would be best to hear the driver narrates to you the history, stories and jokes about each of the places the tour covered. Pakdokter would recommend to just sit on the bus for a complete bus tour of the city first which would take about one and a half hour - then to continue on the bus and stop at the places that interest you.

As pakdokter sat through the bus tour - pakdokter told himself that when pakdokter returned home pakdokter must check out how the Hop-On-Hop-Off bus of KL is.

these horse carriages were seen outside the St Stephen's Park

just to the south of our hotel,

but pakdokter was not sure which parts of the city

the carriage-tour will go to..

and pakdokter wondered if the tricycles below

were driven by university students earning money

during the summer holidays to pay for their university fees....

The yellow coloured boats on wheels or the 'Duck Tours' are also a common feature in many cities these days. Pakdokter first took a 'duck-tour' in Boston many years ago. It was a very exciting ride both on water as well as on the streets, witty,informative and interactive tour with a very articulate tour guide-cum-boat/bus driver. As one can see from the picture above - the tourists on the 'duck-tour' all wore the 'Viking' head-gear and from the constant screaming and shouting from the tourists on the boat - they must be having a really great time.

Dublin also has a modern tram service but perhaps this was not the best way to tour the city.

Of special interest in Dublin was the 'bicycle-rental' facility which pakdokter noticed at various parts of the city. One makes the payment to rent the bike from the coin-booth and takes the bicycle for the specified hours of the rental and can return it back at the many other stations where they can be taken out or parked. Our city authorities should come and study this service and perhaps consider starting this facility for our city folks. This is indeed a very 'green' initiative which the city of Dublin has embarked upon.