Drinking at the Guinness Factory

If we are friends in real life you will know beer is not usually my first choice but I made an exception while in Ireland last Fall – not only did I drink beer but I visited the Guinness Storehouse, often called the Guinness Factory, not once but twice! The first time I went after my morning at Kilmainham Gaol and feeding the deer in Phoenix Park, hence the same oxblood pants, and I visited Guinness at dusk as a coworker told me the sunset from the rooftop sky bar was not to be missed.

Now I have been to a ton of museums in my life and this was one of the best interactive, well laid out museums I have ever been to where you enter on the first floor and slowly work your way up half a dozen floors learning how they make Guinness, the history of the brand, explore their decades of advertising, learn about the different aspects that go into tasting, enroll the academy where you learn how to pour a Guinness properly, and end up at the roof bar to drink the pint of Guinness included in your ticket. If you are going to visit a factory while in Dublin I would choose the Guinness factory over the Teeling Whiskey Distillery Tour if you can only do one, but the second is worth the time too. Take a look at my first trip to the Guinness Storehouse at St. James Gate:

Then five days later I was back again with my childhood best friend. Esmé and I have traded visiting each other for the last 15 years with me going to visit her in London and Cambridge, England and her coming to New York for New Year’s or Smorgasburg in Brooklyn. However, this was the first time we have met in a country where neither of us lived – she flew from London to Dublin and joined me for the last two days of my solo Ireland trip. She had never been to the city for fun so we decided to include a trip to the Guinness Factory on short weekend trip!