What's happening in Dublin this week?

The Paddy Power Comedy Festival likely still has shows at Iveagh Gardens this week, the Victorian-era park south of St. Stephen's Green. Recent lineups included Jason Byrne, Gearoid Farrelly, and Serena Terry on The Bleedin Massive Stage, with Emma Doran and Rory O'Hanlon at The Only Joke Inn tent. Whelans on Wexford Street runs the Funny Focail strand, a mix of Irish-language comedy and English sets. Festival tickets at Iveagh Gardens typically run €25-40 per session. Worth noting, the outdoor stages mean weather matters here. Dublin currently sits around 18-19°C but the breeze drops the felt temperature closer to 15-16°C, with overcast skies and humidity near 58%. A light rain jacket saves you after the first 90 minutes outdoors at Iveagh Gardens.

Dublin's food week follows a fixed pattern. The Temple Bar Food Market opens every Saturday at Meeting House Square from 10am to 4:30pm. You'll find Irish farmhouse cheeses, brown soda bread with its coarse wheaten crumb, and smoked salmon from the Burren Smokehouse in County Clare. The smell of frying boxty drifts across the square by 11am. A single boxty, a thick potato pancake, crisp on the outside, runs roughly €5-7. Weekday lunches near Trinity College tend toward the Fade Street and South William Street corridor, where 3-4 small restaurants serve lunch plates for €12-16. For evening meals, the strip along Camden Street and Wexford Street, about a 15-minute walk south of Grafton Street, has been Dublin's strongest mid-price restaurant neighborhood for the past few years. Pints currently average €6.50-7.50 in the city centre (roughly $7.40-8.50 at the current rate), closer to €6 in Stoneybatter or Phibsborough.

Monday is the best museum day in Dublin. The National Gallery of Ireland on Merrion Square stays open (free admission, founded 1854), as does the National Museum's archaeology branch on Kildare Street. Christ Church Cathedral dates to 1031 and charges €10 for adults. The nave smells of old stone and candle wax, cool even in late summer. Down in the crypt, a mummified cat and rat sit in a glass case, trapped in an organ pipe centuries ago. Tuesday through Thursday Dublin feels most local. O'Donoghue's on Merrion Row runs traditional music sessions from about 9pm, and mid-week the crowd tends to be maybe 60% regulars rather than the weekend tourist majority. Friday evenings shift toward Grand Canal Dock. Saturday morning, take the DART from Connolly Station to Howth (25 minutes, roughly €3 on a Leap card) for the harbour market and fried-fish stands along the West Pier.

Late-summer weather in Dublin follows a learnable pattern. Mornings tend to start overcast and around 14-15°C. By 2pm you might get a break of sun near 19-20°C, but a shower can roll in from Dublin Bay within 20 minutes. The air smells of wet pavement and hops near the Guinness Storehouse area in The Liberties. Sunset this week falls around 9:30pm, which gives long evenings for the Royal Canal towpath or a pint outside in Portobello. Sunday in Dublin is quiet. Grafton Street shops open at noon rather than the weekday 9:30am. Phoenix Park, at 707 hectares, is emptiest before 10am on Sundays, when the resident fallow deer herd grazes near the Papal Cross.