Guinness Storehouse & Brewery

♫ Come with me, and you'll be, in a world of pure imagination... ♫♪

Of course, one of the first things I did in Dublin was go to the St. James Gate Guinness Brewery and Storehouse. This is the 9,000 year lease on the building that Arthur Guinness signed in 1759. He had big plans.

♫  If you want to view paradise. Simply look around and view it. Anything you want to do it. Wanta change the world? There's nothing to it. ♫ 

♫  There is no, life I know, to compare with pure imagination ♫ 

♫  Living there, you'll be free, if you truly wish... to be. ♫

Okay I'll stop.

If I didn't already feel like I was in Willie Wonka's factory, I would have when entering... The Tasting Rooms

♫ We'll begin, with a spin, Traveling in, the world of my creation, What we'll see, Will defy explanation ♫

I can't stop. This song will still be stuck in my head for days. 

What you are smelling there my friend (who I don't know and hope don't mind being on my blog), you're smelling hops. This was one of four pillars in the first tasting room blowing out a mist of aroma. Each one the individual smell of an ingredient in Guinness.

It was time to be taught how to properly drink Guinness. Something about it felt like communion. 

The Velvet Room, where they teach people how to properly drink a Guinness. Churning out an army of beer snobs seven days a week. Elbow up, breathe in, drink, swirl it around your mouth while exhaling.

Generations of Guinness Commercials

The Guinness Academy. Okay smart guy, you think you already know how to properly drink a Guinness, but do you know how to properly pour a Guinness? I do.

Because I took a class. That's mine on the right waiting 119 seconds for the nitrogen gas and carbon dioxide to form that creamy head Guinness is known for. 

Next, top it off and present to the customer logo out.

That customer was me. I took the Guinness I pour myself to the Gravity Bar on the top floor

With views of the brewery and the city below

To Dublin!