The holiday season in Ireland

A quick heads up for anyone planning to visit the country during the Christmas season. Everything (and I mean everything) will be closed for about a week. The entire country goes on holiday and that's that.

We don't really do anything for Christmas. It's not as obnoxious here as in the US. I stopped going into stores from November 1 years ago, driven out by the crowds, the annoying music and relentless commercialism. There's much less of that here. Very little blaring music, thank god, so you're able to think about what you're doing.

The days really are short and the dark pervasive so we appreciate the public lighting (people in our area don't light up their houses). It's mostly white and pretty in a winter wonderland sort of way. The local park is lovely to walk through at night. The weather is milder so we're not freezing our butts off, there's a small pond with a large white swan made of lights in the middle. The usual light poles are topped with things that are kind of like light sculptures. An abandoned building in town has blue light projected onto it, with snowflakes floating down it.  It's all more wintery than Christmasy, although one corner of the park has an ugly Santa, Disney character and enormous (and strangely leering) snowman in lights for the kids. The overall effect is one of mitigating winter darkness in a thoughtful way, not jangling you into false jolliness.

They do have some awesome fireworks over the harbour. We walk through the park, past the swan to stand on the bridge to watch. I have no idea what the fish think of it all.

it is lovely in Summer Dublin and country side u r welcome in green land