Let’s be honest: it rains a lot in Dublin 🙂 As fun as it is to go to the beach or park on a sunny day, there are a fair share of days (winter, spring, summer, and fall) that call for doing something inside. Most of the time the boys are happy to go on an easy outing to a cafe or the library or bookstore, but sometimes we go for something a little more ambitious. Here are some of the favorite indoor adventures we’ve discovered over the past few years. 

1. Funky Monkey: a great indoor play area with climbing, tunnels, slides, and toys. Parents can sit and have a coffee while the kids romp around. We’ve loved meeting up with friends here on a rainy day. 

2.Rainforest Adventure Golf: we only made it to this mini golf place once as it’s a little far from where we live, but it was a fun way to pass a Sunday afternoon as a family. The “rainforest” decor is ancient Mayan/Aztec civilizations, and while it’s a bit cheesy for adults, the kids loved it. 

3. National Aquatic Center: Probably Isaac’s favorite place in Dublin, this is a great indoor pool and mini water-park. There’s a pirate ship to climb on with small slides for young ones, a large pool that sometimes becomes a wave pool, a lazy river, and a few larger water slides as well. Definitely a fun day out. And as at every pool in Ireland, you have to wear a swim hat.

4. The Ark: The Ark is a children’s cultural center in Dublin that puts on plays, concerts, art classes, and other special activities for kids. Last summer, Isaac and I did a one time class about colors and painting, and it was really cool.  We learned the history of how paints were made and mixed and had a chance to paint our own still life. I would have liked to have done more at the Ark, but you have to plan ahead and sign up for the classes or plays ahead of time so it only worked out for us the one time. 

5. Dublinia:  An interesting museum in town that teaches about Dublin’s history during the Viking and Medieval periods. There are audio visual exhibits with Viking and Medieval characters, and a few interactive things like writing your name in Viking rune alphabet, smelling spices in the Medieval market and throwing balls at a statue stuck in the stocks. The boys especially likes getting Viking and knight helmets at the gift shop to take home. 

6. Butlers Chocolate Factory Tour: For a special treat, we joined some friends one day to tour the Butlers Chocolate Factory. The delicious Irish chocolate is sold throughout the country (and the world) and we loved getting to learn about the chocolate making process, outfitted in our very own lab coats and hairnets. The highlights were all the samples given throughout the tour and then decorating our own chocolate elephants at the end. 

7. Imaginosity Children’s Museum: This excellent children’s museum has a lot of wonderful exhibits and interactive hands-on activities. Cars to drive, a submarine, construction crane, grocery store and a large indoor climbing structure are just some of the highlights. There are also several dedicated areas for very young kids/babies. We only made it here a few times but had a lot of fun when we did! 

8. Build-a-Bear: While this isn’t unique to Dublin, we enjoyed making a rainy day visit to the build-a-bear shop here. Each boy got to pick his own bear, help stuff it, and then choose accessories/outfits. It’s definitely a special treat type outing rather than a regular thing as each bear ends up costing a small fortune! But it was definitely a winner with the boys for a rainy day. 

So even on less than ideal weather days in Dublin, there are still some great choices for kids’ activities, and we’ve loved getting to check them out over the last few years.