On Thursday 21st April, all TY students had a cultural trip to Croke Park and Glasnevin Cemetery in North Dublin. I had never been to either of these famous places so I was particularly looking forward to visiting them, especially Croke Park.
We arrived to the monstrous Croke Park just after 9.15am having left school at 8.30am. It is considered to be the home of GAA football and hurling in Ireland and is the third largest stadium in Europe. After a short film on the all Ireland finals of last September, we were split into two groups, each group being given a guide. Our guide was called Christie, an extremely nice and patient man who knew absolutely everything there was to know about GAA and Croke Park.
We began our tour in the changing rooms and gradually made our way around the stadium, finishing in the museum. The most impressive part of the whole tour by far was when we walked on to the pitch. It gave us a glimpse of what it must be like to be a player walking out to the roar of 80,000 fans on a match day. It was brilliant!
In the afternoon we visited Glasnevin Cemetery which is where anyone famous in Ireland is buried. We were given a guided tour and we saw many important graves including the tombstones of Michael Collins, Eamonn de Valera etc.. It really was interesting.
I found the day really enjoyable especially the tour of Croke Park as it was something I had seen before but never been to.