I meet up my friend CJ for a walk this morning. We head to The Liberties for coffee at a place called Two Pups. Surprisingly, they have a few chairs out front, but they’re already taken, so we walk another couple of blocks over to the park at St. Patrick’s. There are plenty of benches, so we pick one and have a long chat.
After finishing our coffee talk, CJ leads us on a walk over to The Coombe, which is a subsection of The Liberties, home of the Teeling Distillery, a few industrial buildings, street art, new shiny apartment buildings, and some charming row brick houses on small streets.
At the the intersection of Reginald and Gray is a sacred heart memorial:
CJ points out this gay-owned container cafe next to St. Patrick’s Tower, originally a dutch-inspired windmill dating back to the late 1700s / early 1800s.
We cross over the Liffey to the Smithfield neighborhood.
View of the Guinness Storehouse on the opposite side:
Smithfield Square where the Light House Cinema is located (where the GAZE International LGBT film festival is held):
There seem to be tons of little coffee shops in the neighborhood, including the “Woke Cup” vegan cafe:
Smithfield used to be a marketplace and stockyard for horses and other livestock, probably the inspiration for this mural:
We head back to CJ’s neighborhood, then I return back over the river to Temple Bar. My friend J is coming over to hang out in the afternoon, watch the new episode of The Mandalorian, play cards and sample the chili I made last week.
Not long ago, the news of the U.S. election finally being called came through. Hallelujah! It feels like there should be celebrations in the streets, but given the COVID lockdown here I’ll have to settle on raising a glass at home.
