Day 119, 31 October 2012, Dublin Walking Tour. What a day! We woke, snug and warm, in our 4th floor eyrie and spent at least 30 minutes listening to the rhythm of the falling rain. With only two days in Dublin however a little bit of Irish weather couldn't put us off, so out we went. We spent 3 hours with Emer (pronounced like Lemur - just no "L") - Dublin born & bred. She led us a merry walk around the city and once more we found ourselves in the footsteps of film producer George Lucas. How he ever managed Star Wars is beyond us - he seems to have travelled as much as we have. For details of the rest of the tour, have a look in the album with a running commentary. Suffice it to say we ended up in the second courtyard of Trinity College Dublin and standing outside the Long Room which contains the Library (pictured - courtesy internet). The library is the largest in Ireland and the architect seriously underestimated the millions of books it would need to hold - so it was outgrown before construction even finished. George Lucas found the library and asked very nicely if he could use it as a set for the Jedi Library. Of course, this being a place of academia, he was turned down. So he sent a colleague in who took thousands of photos and from them he constructed a virtual library - with Jedi Knights on the busts instead of professors. The Library was incredibly displeased so now no-one can take photos (stable - door - horse - bolted?). Inside the library is the famed Book of Kells illuminated manuscript which also draws many thousands of tourists a year - but it's a bit expensive and we know where there's a replica (so in George Lucas like fashion we'll nip off and have a look at that). Another fascinating thing they have in the library is the Irish harp. When Ireland became an independent country in the 50s they wanted a symbol that couldn't be claimed by one religion or another and chose the harp. The only major problem was Guinness had been using the harp since the 1700s. And the new Ireland didn't want to be associated with alcohol (seriously - think it was a bit late just quietly). So they asked Guinness if they could change their harp just a touch so there would be no confusion. So they reversed it. Now obviously the first thing we did after the tour was go to O'Neill's pub, buy a Guinness, with cod & chips, whip out the Irish €1 coin and compared it with the Guinness harp - and indeed they are mirror images. Right then. No risk of getting the two images confused at all! Prior to the tour we would have to say everything we knew about Irish history could have been written on the back of a postage stamp. In very blunt pencil. We are now both thoroughly educated in all things Irish ... albeit from a very passionate Irish point of view. No bad thing.