Post-Travel: Dublin

St. Kevin's, Harrington Street, Dublin

As you might have noticed, I've been on hiatus for quite a while.  Longer than I realized, even!  I spent quite a bit of last year prepping for a trip to Ireland at the end of the year, in which I managed to achieve some of my genealogical goals there, missed out on others, and created a few brand new ones.  Since then I've had a bit of a travel hangover, and subsequently got more than a little distracted with current events in America, but the less said of that, the better.

Accomplished: visiting one of the neighborhoods my Dublin ancestors lived in, walking down their streets and even stepping inside their parish church, St. Kevin's (pictured).  This one was a big one for me!  I also got to visit Glasnevin Cemetery, where many of them are buried, and got to see their gravesites as well as the graves of many people who are important to Irish history.

Missed out: visiting the National Library, National Archives, and Registry of Deeds.  Unfortunately, none of the days I was in Dublin corresponded with times any of these repositories were open.  The only weekday we were there was Halloween, which is a big public holiday in Ireland and so they were all closed that day too.  Next trip over I'm definitely staying in Dublin during the week!

Stained glass window, St. Kevin's

Brand new research goals:  I'll leave those to their own posts!  That's honestly been part of the problem picking up again and blogging, I can't decide where to even start.  Let's just say I've uncovered some interesting new research angles to explore with my Irish relatives, including a recent discovery of additional ties to Dublin in another branch of the family.  Of course, my main goal is to go back!  Dublin is an incredible city, and despite it not being "home", thanks to spending much of the last few years researching it, it felt comfortable and familiar.  There's so much to see and do there as well.  It truly is a global treasure and I couldn't help but understand why so many people in my family made it their home.

Photographs of St. Kevin's © the author, 2016.