We’ll all go to Dublin in the Green, in the Green

The beautiful, gentle one, whom I call Pollyanna, went off with one of her friends for a City break in Dublin. Ever helpful I donned my travel Journalists hat, reached into my well stocked bookshelf and handed her my copy of The Travellers Guide to Dublin and offered her the wealth of my experience of places not to be missed.

On their return she gave me the guide book and suggested that it was probably as old as I am. They found Phoenix Park, The Halfpenny Bridge and the Statue of Molly Malone in spite of my guide handbook. Apparently the place place has changed a little since the coming of the Celtic Tiger. On checking the guidebook I saw that it was dated 1999…. no age at all. I went to my well stocked bookcase and checked a few dates – Rough Guide to Milan (2003) – Vancouver Lonely Planet (1997) – Barcelona (2005) – Andalusia (1995) – Catalonia (1997) – Rough Guide to Sicily (2003) – Mauritius (2004) – then Malta, Morocco, Singapore, Israel, Hong Kong, Sydney, Cairns, and Delhi all even older. Oh! Pollyanna’s suggestion that these yellowing pages of my travel library are about as much use as a chocolate teapot, really hurt. She also suggested that my 1956 guide to Capetown might fetch good money among the old books at Hay in Wye! I have dusted my books and replaced them on their shelves.

They might not be useful but they are my memories. To quote William Butler Yates “Tread softly because you tread on my dreams. I shall take my laptop on my travels in future. A lot more use than Biedekers, however there will not be more shelf space, even if I never read them.

By the way William Butler Yeats also wrote “No country for old men.