Dublin is a wonderful city to visit, no matter what time or year. Spring is the ideal season to visit Dublin because its off-season and the rates are reasonable and because it's when many of the holidays and festivals occur. Of course, the most important holiday in Dublin is St. Patrick's Day. If you'd like to visit during the holiday, be sure to make reservations!

Dublin is well known for its extensive shopping areas, such as Temple Bar, Nassau Street, Henry Street, O'Connell Street, St. Stephen's Green, and Grafton Street. The Brown Thomas department store on Grafton Street is a great place to check the local styles and Irish designs.

Dublin offers several department stores that will keep you busy for hours. St. Stephen's shopping mall offers the largest department store. This area of Dublin gets busy in the summer with plenty of hustle and bustle. Plan on making reservations at restaurants to save on lengthy waits in line.

Dublin shopping offers variety for everyone, with choices among clothing, jewelry, crafts, and antiques. Dawson Street is the area to head to if you are looking for smaller, exclusive clothing stores. The stores will offer one-of-a-kind designer items -- quality clothing at a higher prices.

Dublin is also famous for its wonderful indoor and outdoor markets that take place at different times of the week. The best and largest market is Mother Redcaps, which can be found in Back Lane. This is a huge indoor market that will delight you with its books, music, antiques, clothes, cheeses, cakes, and other tasty treats.

Dublin has many wonderful bookstores that will be of interest to the general book reader, as well as the specialist who is looking for a first edition print. For a good selection of antiquarian books you will want to go to Catch Books, which is located on Duke Street. If you are traveling to Dublin take the time out of your busy sight- seeing schedule to spend a few hours, or days, shopping.