See Dublin by Bike

Our Taste of Dublin tour starts at our base at the Daintree Building, off trendy Camden Street and takes in Dublin Castle, the Guinness Brewery, St Patrick's Cathedral, Temple Bar, the 'Italian Quarter', O'Connell Street, the Millennium Spire and the General Post Office, Merrion Square and St Stephen's Green. We also bring you east towards the bay to 'new Dublin' and the Grand Canal Dock area.

But that's only the start. Our comprehensive tour takes in hidden gems along the way - Gray Street's Catholic Emancipation monument; the 18th century Roe's Distillery windmill, and more. Along the way, you'll hear about Dublin's history, its literary and musical traditions, and the events and personalities that shaped the city's character, from your tour guides, Seán or Julian.

What was Dublin like when the band were growing up? What were the influences that shaped their music?

On our two hour tour you can see:

a)  The music venue with the band’s lyrics on the wall
b) The school that expelled Bono
c)  The Project Arts Centre where they met their manager, opposite their Clarence Hotel
d)  Windmill Lane, location of the building (sadly demolished),where their early recordings were made
e)  The band’s Hanover Studio in the south docklands
f )  The Grand Canal lock where the cover of “October” was shot
g)  The site of their famous Dandelion Market early gigs
h)  The shop that gave Bono his name
i)  The Oscar Wilde quote Bono chose at the Merrion Square memorial
j  The café that takes its name from a U2 song

We also stop at Dublin Castle, Guinness, O’Connell Street and other places, to get a sense of the U2 home town, it’s history and character – a basic understanding of their hometown.

We visit the GPO, from where the Proclamation of the Irish Republic was proclaimed; We then follow the route taken by the retreating garrison on the Friday night to Moore Street, where they surrendered on Saturday the 29th April; We visit Parnell Square, scene of the historic meeting of the IRB in September, 1914. We take in the Garden of Remembrance and The Rotunda Hospital, where insurgents were held after the rebellion was over; Liberty Hall, where preparations were made for that fateful Easter Monday and Jame’s Connolly’s statue; Dublin Castle, where government power was centred and City Hall, where the first fatality occurred; Boland’s Mills and Bakery, St. Stephen’s Green and The College of Surgeons, three of the other rebel garrisons in the city. The route of the Easter Rising Tour includes Mount Street Bridge on the Grand Canal, where the highest casualties were suffered by the government side.

Our tour guides re-live that momentous week with you, profile the main protagonists, outline the ‘rights and wrongs’, and offer reflections on the historical context and the aftermath and legacy of the insurgency.

Dublin’s literary achievers include Swift, Beckett, Shaw, Wilde, Joyce, Yeats – and many more. So why not discover more by taking our literary tour?

See Dublin by Bike offer a literary themed tour where we visit some of the places associated with the city’s great writers; among these the house on Merrion Square that was Yeats’s home between 1922 and 1928; the Shaw birthplace, the house of Joyce’s The Dead on Ussher’s Quay; Patrick Kavanagh’s statue, The Oscar Wilde memorial, St Patrick’s Cathedral where Swift was dean; James Joyce’s old school.