Weekend in Dublin: Guinness Storehouse Tour

You can't go to Dublin without hearing about Guinness. The family has contributed a lot to the history and success of the city and nowhere is that more celebrated than the Guinness Storehouse tour. The building itself is shaped like a large Guinness glass and you move from bottom to top exploring the story of Guinness and getting to taste some of the 'black gold'. It was a fun experience and Guinness really does taste better in Ireland.

The ground floor was a huge gift shop - everything you could possibly imagine with a Guinness logo on it. The first floor (photos below) walked through the ingredients of Guinness: water, hops, malted barley, yeast.

The second floor walked us through the brewing process. The tour was completely self guided - a brilliant approach as they could fit twice the people in for each tour. And at $20 a pop, that's a pretty good return on investment for them.

about an hour

The next floor was all about distribution. We saw how the barrels used to be made by hand through an interesting video and also how Guinness developed a revolutionary way to transport to the far reaches of the globe (yep, it's that rattle you hear in the cans that does it - well, and some other scientific explanation). On this floor we also had our first tasting, which was served in tiny cute little Guinness glasses. As pretentious as any wine tasting we've been to!

The next floor was all about their marketing and how it has evolved over time.  Brian and I remember seeing these kinds of 'Guinness is good for you' advertisements in Guinea, West Africa when we were in the Peace Corps.

And the top floor is a panoramic bar where you can get your free pint, which is included with your ticket. Crowded and a bit warm because of the sun, but the Guinness was oh so good.

Don't worry, you get a full pint. They fill to here and then let the glasses rest before they fill them the rest of the way to make sure you get a full pint.