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Monday 6/25

Waited outside St Ann’s Church in the rain for about an hour because the officials didn’t know when we were coming for practice.  Chris and I took a walk, using the facilities at a two story McDonalds.  The alters where we sang had chest high music stands for the basses to hold music, a nice experience, but unfortunately the bass section had trouble following the director, and we drove the altos crazy.  The noon concert had 83 in attendance including our choir groupies.  This was our first tour with a string quartet, which often started and finished the concerts, as well as accompanying several pieces. The strings added greatly to the pleasure of singing the concerts. It was lovely just to hear them play. The audience included two women who came up to tell us later that they had come to Dublin from out of town especially to hear us. One had come from near Waterford.

Next was a visit to see the Book of Kells at the Trinity College Library.  This is a lavishly decorated copy in Latin of the four gospels from ~500AD.  A second part of the library allowed us to walk through the stacks of old books, where there was an exhibit of World War I and II recruiting posters from Ireland.  Some people took the Guinness Brewery tour, but we chose our own itinerary.  After a stop at the Bank of Ireland to exchange on outdated Irish currency note for Euros, we took a disappointing walk through the National Gallery of Ireland, but the walk through St Stephen’s Green turned up a tufted duck and moorhen. 

Dinner after evensong at St Patrick’s Cathedral, the longest church in Ireland, was at an Italian fish restaurant with the Mecoms, McKays, Rivers, Bonnie Bell, and Risa Brown.