The Dublin City Guide: 48 Hours in a City That Punches Above Its Size

Dublin is a small city that behaves like a much bigger one. It has produced an absurd density of writers, it will talk to you at a bus stop, and it manages to be both a serious European capital and a place where a stranger might walk you to wherever you're lost. Forty-eight hours isn't enough — it never is — but it's enough to fall for it.

Day one: the grand and the literary

Start at Trinity College, where the Long Room of the Old Library is the kind of space that makes people involuntarily lower their voices, and the Book of Kells justifies the queue. Walk the Georgian squares — Merrion and Fitzwilliam — for those famous fanlit doors, then lose an hour in the National Gallery or the (free, excellent) National Museum. Cross the river for a pilgrimage to the Guinness Storehouse, where the rooftop Gravity Bar hands you a pint and the whole city at once.

Where to eat and drink

Dublin's food scene has quietly become very good indeed. Skip the obvious and head for the Liberties and around Camden Street for the interesting stuff. For the pint, the rule is simple: avoid the most touristed strips of Temple Bar and find a proper old pub — the kind with snugs, slow taps and no television. The pour takes its time. So should you.

Day two: coast and calm

Jump on the DART — the coastal train — and within half an hour you're somewhere completely different. North to Howth for a cliff walk, fresh seafood and a working fishing pier; south to Dalkey and Killiney for the "Irish Riviera" and a coastline that has seduced more than one famous resident. Back in town, Phoenix Park (one of Europe's largest enclosed city parks, complete with a resident deer herd) is the city exhaling.

Forty-eight hours isn't enough — it never is — but it's enough to fall for it.

The verdict

Dublin doesn't overwhelm you with sights; it wins you over with character. Walk it, talk to it, and let at least one evening go gloriously unplanned.