Irish Horseracing
The muscles of the horses straining as they make a final dash to the finish line, the jockeys hunched up on the horses' backs to streamline that last bit of wind resistance, the panorama of the Irish Countryside stretching nearly to Heaven. That's horseracing at Leopardstown Racecourse on the outskirts of Monkstown, about the same distance south of Dublin as Shannon Airport is to the north.

Getting There
If those directions appear to be a little imprecise, it is because that is the way of the Irish, as you will find out if you read the next page on Traveling in Ireland. But for now, let it suffice to say, do not listen to anyone about buses that go to Leopardstown from Dublin. We tried to track down the ones that supposedly do that. We went to the central bus station, finally found a stationmaster that knew there even WAS a bus that went that way, who told us to go out a certain door, and find a certain colored bus, not one he had anything to do with, and... we never found it. We found sixteen other buses of the right shape and color, but not that one. Why? Because we found another stationmaster who admitted the bus had been canceled.

So take DART. Take any train south to Monkstown. Get off, get a taxi at either the tiny station or walk two blocks up the hill to the main street and get a taxi. On the way, enjoy the incredible scenery of the Irish Riviera of Monkstown. Never mind the temperature. It is lovely. Dublin Bay to your left. Even if you do not want to go to the racetrack, it is worth it just to take DART south and see Monkstown. It is full of music and restaurants that are different from the Dublin scene. Give it a try and see if you like it as much as we did.

Getting In
You can either purchase a reserved seat, a very nice one, on the net from the Leopardstown website before you go, or do so once you get there. We, of course, did a prepurchase and had our ticket waiting there, partly because it was fun having our ticket waiting for us at the gate (very easy to pick up, and it makes you feel a little special) and partly because it's fun buying tickets to European things through the web. Click here to go to Leopardstown.

We were given tags to wear in our lapels that allowed us to go anywhere in the public areas of the track. (There are limited access tickets available at the track). We were directed up, and up, and up, to our reserved seats that were perfectly situated to give a spectacular panoramic view of the track, the races, the hills, the sky... wow. I would say there is hardly a prettier view in Ireland, though I'm sure there is. I was impressed. The photos on this page were taken from my seat, with a disposable camera. Imagine how truly amazing the view is in person.

Making a Bet
You have so many choices. The first set of choices is Tote betting. For this you go to the Tote counters and windows and stand-alone machines set up literally everywhere, and select any number of different ways to bet, on combinations and matrixes of combinations that neither Colleen nor I understood in our meager few hours there. We simply bet to win or to place, and that was easy.

REALLY EASY for her, especially. Which was okay, because she picked winners in every single race except the last one where her jockey got thrown from his hose. That was quite an event. I had noticed ambulances tagging along with the field of horses on each race, thinking that was a bit overcautious. Turns out they were quite relevant. Unbelievably, no one was injured in the spill that included several horses and jockeys, with one being stepped on by his horse. But I thought the ambulances were a good idea after that happened.

The other way to bet is to go downstairs to where the Bookies have their places. That is really fun, although a little intimidating the first time because it is so different than anything in America. The legal Bookies have a leather bag, and their own betting slips, and put their own individual odds up on their own small chalkboard. The odds change minute to minute, and from Bookie to Bookie, all the way up to the cutoff before the race. There are waves of changes, sometimes, as everyone decides the odds need to come down before people will bet on a certain horse, or there is a scratch, or any number of things happen. It is exciting, and a little strange, and a bit of a challenge the first time. But it's worth it.
That is how I did my betting.

In the picture of the racecourse above, you can see a woman in a red raincoat. That is Colleen going over to the Bookies to place a bet. She liked the Tote windows better, but she had to give it a try one time.
Yes, she won that way, too.

Getting Out
Reserve a taxi beforehand. Maybe a day beforehand. We did not. I was sure that we could just catch a cab there and go leisurely back to DART, perhaps stopping on the way at a restaurant for dinner. There were plenty of cabs. All reserved. I was flabergasted. So we walked, quite a distance, over the anti-foot-and-mouth carpeting, past the carpark (Yes, you can drive your own car there. I wouldn't) out to the main gate on the road that leads to Monkstown. Spoke to a nice policeman of La Guardia, the Irish constabulary. Kindly, he told us, as he had millions before us, that there were no cabs there either. Nor any buses.

Except there was the city bus that, if you walked far enough down the road, you could catch at a bus stop. So we walked. And walked. And just as Colleen was about to fall face down in the desert sand (not really, just a metaphor) a bus happened along just as we got to the bus stop. We did not care where it was going.
We got on.

It happened to be going to the DART station! Celebration on the top deck! We went up the stairs to the second level of the irish bus, and sat in air conditioned comfort, watching the now-lovely-again scenery of Monkstown parade before our eyes, little 'chemists shops' and nurseries and pubs and everything quaint, mixed with the modern. But nothing so lovely as the bus turn-around at the Monkstown DART station.
We returned to Dublin via the next DART north, the trip home even more spectacular as the sun set, tireder but wiser about the ways of the Irish.

Ah, but that was just a little side trip. We wanted to go to the heart of Ireland. So we rented a car and headed off to Athlone in the middle of the countryside. Click here to go with us on a unique journey.

But if you're ready to head to Ireland and the rest of Europe, take a look at