Ireland day 0416. Friday 18 November 2022- Chocolate! *

Ireland day 0416. Friday 18 November 2022- Chocolate!

Today’s summary	I spent the day at the Botanic Gardens while Val was working later in the afternoon and evening. I attended a Plant Science Festival and won a selection pack of chocolate in a lecture on genetics
Today’s weather	Dry sunny and bright all day. Light westerly wind. About 7C.

Today’s overview location (The blue mark shows the location of my route)		Close-up location (The green line shows where I walked) (Click button below to download GPX of today’s walk as recorded, or see interactive map at bottom with elevations corrected): Drumcondra to Glasnevin

Commentary

(Summary blog only. Last full blog was Day 0368).

Val was working in the evening so I spent the day at the Botanic Gardens attending a couple of lectures laid on as part of the “Plant Science Festival” which is running all this week.

The first was on the genetics of chocolate and the second was the role plants play in engineering the climate and even geology of the whole planet.

Absolutely fascinating and especially enjoyable as I won a selection pack of chocolate bars in the first lecture (for knowing that the scientific name for chocolate is Theobroma cacao – ok call me a nerd)

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


The main palm house which occupies a dominant position overlooking the gardens	Pelargoniums thriving in the conservatory near the car park. Made me feel (briefly) like I was on the Mediterranean

Part of the science festival was a series of exhibitions by researchers from the Botanic gardens and various Irish universities, primarily aimed at getting students interest in plants. It was well attended – mostly, it seemed, by pupils from local senior schools	*Bird of paradise flower (Strelitzia regina) in the temperate house*



*Professor Liam Dolan FRS from the Gregor Mendel Institute in Vienna in full swing delivering the keynote lecture “Plants: the planetary engineers that make life on Earth possible“*