Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque Muscat

I have just returned from a week in Musat, Oman where I had the most fantastic time. It is a beautiful country and I saw some amazing sights.

On Thursday my sister and I visited the Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque.

The first thing we had to do to get to the Mosque was hail a taxi and then negotiate a price. My younger sister who lives in Muscat (but was working that day so couldn't give us a lift) had told us what price it should be. The bargaining with taxi drivers was painful for us but we continued to haggle and got all the taxis for the price we wanted. On this occasion the first taxi we hailed wouldn't entertain the price we offered so we hailed the next one and got it for 2 Rial (about 5 euro).

When we got to the Grand Mosque we walked up through the stunning gardens to the entrance.

As you enter the mosque there is a sign with the dress code. You must wear long sleeves to the wrist and trousers to the ankle and women must also cover their head. You must also take your shoes off when you enter the prayer rooms.

The mosque is very beautiful and is covered in the most wonderful marble that is so nice underfoot. There is a lovely calm serene feeling outside.

The main prayer hall has a magnificent chandelier in the certain of it. The scale is massive - it has to be seen to believed!

The large prayer hall can accommodate 6,500 men with the ladies prayer room holding 750 women. In total the mosque can accommodate 20,000 people.

It also has the largest single piece of carpet in the world which took 4 years to make!!

No trip to Muscat would be complete without a visit to the Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque. It should also be noted that abaya's are available to rent if you don't have a long sleeved top so don't let the dress code be a deterrent.

For further info about the Grand Mosque, read here or for a 360 degree panoramic tour, click here. The wiki page also has some interesting facts about the mosque.

Delivering and hanging art!

My sister got a new art piece and you can click below to watch the delivery and installation by the artist!!

https://www.pscp.tv/Pigsyinspace/1djGXvVaVnzxZ?t=30

It's worth a watch - and you get to hear my Irish brogue ;-)

Good Friday - Great Friday!

Friday night meant a trip to the theatre with my cousin and sister to see the The Train. 

What a show. 

It's a musical.........I love musicals!

Although being a musical, it's on a very serious topic that women in Ireland are still fighting for today: Bodily Autonomy.

You can click in to the video below to see story of the Contraceptive Train that the play is based on.




The Abbey Theatre is a great place to see any play. I had bought the cheapest tickets so we possibly had the worst seats in the house. We were right in the back row but I can honestly say there wasn't a thing wrong with the view. I don't think there is a bad seat in this theatre - just some are better than others.

When I got home I looked at the cast online as I knew that one of the actors was very familiar. When I saw who it was - Lisa Lambe - I instantly remembered her from when she was in Celtic Woman. She is one seriously talented lady.

All of the pubs are closed on Good Friday in Ireland due to licensing laws (again due to the non division between Church and State) but alcohol was allowed to be served in The Abbey. There are some strange places that do not fall under the ban - airports, train stations, hotels (in the residents bar) and also theatres. Pre-show drinks were nice along with interval wine too!!
All very civilised.

The Train chugs out of Dublin and on to The Mac in Belfast - do go see it!!

Litter Picking Friday - Team Dublin Clean Up

While browsing twitter on Friday morning I came across a Dublin wide clean up campaign called #TeamDublinCleanup.
I tweeted for further info and found out that there was one going on in both Ranelagh and Donnybrook along with other areas of the town including Stonybatter, Finglas and Phibsboro.

Amy said she would be interested in doing it also and so we went along to the Ranelagh Arts Centre at 11am.

There we got Hi-Viz vests, litter pickers, plastic bags and gloves and off we went litter picking!

There were a fair few volunteers out cleaning - one man did great work at the entrance to the park and another group did a job on the lane at the side of Supervalu (which is a bit of a litter blackspot, I think). Amy and I picked litter from the luas flyover to the triangle and then back down the street on the Arts centre side.

It was brilliant to see the community engagement and spirit and I like the optics of the community getting out to help. This was the 2nd annual #TeamDublinCleanUp and I think it will get bigger and better year on year!

There is a Dublin Canal Action Day next Saturday, click here for info. They are looking for volunteers so do go along if you are free and want to get involved.

Venice - what a marvellous city!

We spent a few days in Venice this week and had a marvellous city break (Venice is only 2.5 hrs from Ireland!).

I received a recommendation for the Al Codega Hotel and it didn't disappoint. It was very well located close to San Marco and rooms were clean and comfortable.

The food was great in Venice - I ate lots of pasta and even more tiramisu! 

The gondolas are fun to watch and feel authentically Venetian. 

We visited the Peggy Guggenheim museum 

We went on an architectural tour on our first day which was really helpful in seeing lots and also getting our bearings. 

All in all a super trip to Venice and then we had a lovely few days off in Dublin before we had to go back to work.

Liffey Cycle - Sunday 2nd April 2017 #LiffeyCycle

Here's a video of the cycle that I blogged about yesterday that Amy and I took part in.

Dublin Liffey Cycleway

This morning Amy and I took part in the #Liffeycycle to demonstrate to the government the level of support for the Liffey Cycleway which is a planned segregated cycleway of 4.6km from the Phoenix Park to the Point Village.

It was a lovely sunny day in Dublin and it was a very enjoyable event.

I took loads of live video which I put up on twitter so unfortunately took no pics.

Here's a photo I found on the internet in which I've marked Amy and I in red.

I estimated there was about 300 cyclists involved but I saw people giving higher numbers on the internet.

Afterwards Amy and I treated ourselves to donuts and a chat in Off Beat Donuts - sure didn't we deserve it?!