On a bus that connects

What can a sightseeing bus tour of your own city teach you? Pádraig O'Connor took the red double decker bus to find out.

Cork City Tour Bus on Grand Parade.

For years now, I’ve often walked past the open top double decker red bus on Grand Parade and wondered, who the hell really needs a guided bus tour around Cork?

Cork city centre is compact, so it’s far easier to navigate your way around town by bicycle or shank’s mare, but it’s true what they say, if you want to see the world from a fresh perspective, then you should either spend some time with children, painters or tourists.

Actually, that last bit was just a thought I had last Tuesday afternoon after I hopped on the Cork City Tour Bus and took my seat on the upper deck while waiting for our journey to begin.

I say “our”, but when the tour bus took off, there were actually only three people on board; the bus driver Tony, an elderly American lady and myself.

Nevertheless, I always get a great kick out of playing the tourist in the place I live and was quite excited for what lay in store. Perhaps this dates back to some very fond memories of showing cousins around Kerry as a child, with one memorable trip in search of the headstone of Sigerson Clifford an absolute highlight, both for what an ordeal it was to find in the days before Google Maps and how drunk my cousin Tess got on the way home.

But I digress; as the bus started off outside the library on Grand Parade, I was curious to see what route we might take and especially what aspects of the city I had overlooked or never knew about.

And naturally, as it turns out, there was quite a lot.

Tony the bus driver.

A pre-recorded audio guide plays when the tour gets underway and as the bus turns down Patrick’s Street, the amount of new information I’ve taken on board, is already quite startling.

If you didn’t have your wits about you however, or were unfamiliar with all the different street names, which I suppose most people on a tour wouldn’t be, then I think it would be difficult to take in all the anecdotes and instructions for where to look as the bus ambles along.

Or more accurately, on this misty May afternoon, stops and starts its way through the after school traffic.

There is a great sense throughout the tour of the outside influence of different people and cultures on the city and how the layout of Cork developed in tandem with the ever increasing level of trade that was taking place from boats and ships coming into port, bringing with them an ever greater need for more infrastructure.

Sound familiar?

If you’re into the history of churches or bridges, then the tour is a must as it seemed at one point as we went up along MacCurtain Street and the area re-branded as the Victorian Quarter and turned down along Patrick’s Quay that they were the sole focus of our polite sounding automated guide.

The tour picked up in interest again as we headed past Camden Quay where we were told that the row of red brick house were an joint investment between local businessmen with the stipulation that whoever lived the longest would take ownership of the whole row. This of course led to some suspicious early deaths among the investors!

When we got up Sunday’s Well and stopped outside the City Gaol, people could get off if they so wished to go inside the prison. No one did, but instead we were joined by a German couple who rather impressively were speaking so loudly to each other I had to strain to hear the audio over them.

I could imagine it might be quite boisterous on a busy day, which Tony the bus driver said is very much weather dependent. He’s been doing the tour for the past thirty years and says “there are good days and bad days, but it’s too late to change now.”

He definitely earns the respect of people on board on a daily basis for how he manages to navigate the bus up around the Shandon Street Area as those streets weren’t built with mass tourism in mind that’s for sure.

The compact route the Cork city sightseeing bus operates

Overall I can see how this tour would appeal to people who might not fancy traipsing around town if they have mobility issues or might be short on time and want to get a quick run down of the area. It’s wouldn’t be necessary either to take in all the stories provided by the audio, as I’m sure it’s just as nice for someone new to Cork just to sit and watch the city unfold in front of their eyes.

It’s not going to be for everyone though. Definitely not the kind of tourist who only wants to talk to locals while on holiday. You probably know the type. They look down on other tourists for their travel choices and never refer to themselves as tourists, but rather travellers. And consequently they would never ever go on a designated bus tour with other tourists.

From my point of view however, I was glad I got on board. It was great to learn so many new details about the local buildings, the history behind various place names, hear tales of all the famous figures who have walked the streets and above all else have the opportunity to see the charming city of Cork in a new light.

Fun fact: Did you know that the first newspaper ever printed in Ireland, and apparently the whole of Europe (The Cork Mercury Monthly) was printed here in Cork in 1649, by Oliver Cromwell. There was a man clearly way ahead of his time in understanding the role of propaganda in the modern nation state.

Cork City Tour operates at multiple times daily from outside the City Library on Grand Parade. For more information please visit their website here