Ireland Guide
Dublin
The Southside
The River Liffey divides the city neatly into north and south sides, and polarizes attitudes on both banks. Pre-eminent among the city's historic sights, looming over the busy, Southside intersection of College Green, is Trinity College, whose main draw for visitors is the glorious Book of Kells. Opposite, near the site of the flat-topped mound that was Dublin's Viking assembly, sits the poignant former House of Parliament, now a particularly ornate branch of the Bank of Ireland. A stone's throw from these august institutions, the city's main commercial street, Grafton Street, marches off towards St Stephen's Green, home to the rococo splendours of see Newman House. Among the stylish Georgian streets to the east of Grafton Street, meanwhile, you'll find the compelling displays of the National Gallery and the National Museum. On the west side of Trinity begins Temple Bar, which somehow manages to remain the city's hub for both carousing and art, overlooked sternly by Dublin Castle, British headquarters in Ireland until 1921 and now home to the glorious collections of the Chester Beatty Library. Dublin's two historic cathedrals, Christ Churchand St Patrick's, stand to the west of here.