Monkey watching

While we were quite happy spending two days at the craft fair, we felt that three would be pushing it a bit, so we decided to spend our last day in Dublin visiting the zoo. We were staying in a hotel within ten minutes' drive of the zoo (well, it would have been, had the signage been up to scratch), but we eventually made it after 14 minutes and paid for our tickets.

The weather had been foul during Friday and Saturday, but on the Sunday it was glorious: bright blue sky and hardly any wind. Fantastic. We walked around a bit, not only admiring the animals, but the displays of Chinese lanterns. They were used for an evening event, when they would be all lit up, but even during day light, they were very impressive. 

They depicted not only animals but characters from Chinese history as well. So fantastically done with wires and some sort of plastic over the top, but they really gave the things they depicted some definition. 

After having spent quite a bit of time watching a giraffe eat some leaves off a tree and some gorillas clamber down a tree, we needed some sustenance. It took ages to get our coffees though and by the time we had finished our lunch, the weather wasn't as nice anymore: dark clouds had moved in. 

By the time we had about seen our last animal, the first drops started to fall and by the time we got back to our car, the drops had turned into a down pour! By the time we got back to the North however, the rain had ceased again and we got home in the dry. 

All in all though: it had been a good weekend.