Statutes & Bridges - Must be Dublin

I have so many pictures of statues and bridges from Dublin that I decided they deserved their own blog page.  Let me begin with the bridges....this little river called the Liffey is as I noted earlier ...a very prominent part of the city of Dublin.  And...getting from one side of the town to the other you need to cross either at a pedestrian bridge or one of the car bridges.  At one time one of the bridges across the Liffey was a pedestrian toll bridge...the "Ha-penny" bridge...

The O'Connell bridge from 1880....O'Connell being the name of the major street thru Dublin...

...then we have the Hauston bridge dedicated in 1828...but erected as you see in 1821...go figure...

Now some of the newer bridges....like the Joyce (as in James) bridge from 2003...

and how about the O'Casey from 2005....

Okay there were many more...trust me....but I saved my favorite and the newest for last....this in person was just awesome....it is the Beckett (yes, as in Samuel) Bridge...

Now for a few of the many statues and really works of art that are in place around Dublin.  The most famous and most photographed is that of Molly Malone....Yes, by day a woman who pushed her cart selling mussels...and then reverted to the world's oldest profession at night!!!  This statue was commissioned for the the millennium and unveiled in 1998...of a very scantily clad Molly...thus causing some controversy.

Another controversial piece of sculpture is that of Anna Livia....it was moved from its location on O'Connell street to accommodate the "erection", if you will,  of the Millennium Spire...now this statue locally is referred to as the "Floozie in the Jacuzzi"...you can guess why...

A favorite collection of sculpture was Famine....it depicted the infamous Irish Famine and was quite moving...it is located along the River Liffey..

Okay....just one more...this one is the man O'Connell who has his own bridge, street and statue...dating back to 1882...

Okay...that was just a sample of the many many statutes....one thing I found interesting was they have beach volley ball in Dublin...well maybe just for a day or two.....this was set up near the Liffy River during the noon hours...

I also found that Dublin has a bike system similar to what we have in Washington, DC...it is the rent a bike by the hour system....here it is Dublin style...

While bikes are in the minority here...Taxi cabs are in the majority.  It is said that Dublin has more taxi cabs than New York city....certainly you have no problem finding one...day or night....

A interesting fact on the buildings in Dublin.  Many have windows like the ones in the building below...and the windows decrease in size as you progress from the ground floor to the first and then the second floor....this is as the result of a tax on windows...the smaller ones required a smaller tax.  Ummm

Trinity College has been around in Dublin since the late 1500's..and is quite impressive...I leave you with this shot of the College.  I am off South of Dublin tomorrow heading to Rosslare and the Harbour to take me over to Wales and Cardiff on Friday.....