Dublin Zoo
Open since 1831 — and for most of the 19th century, a penny got working-class Dubliners in on Sundays to see the same lions that drew Ulysses S. Grant.
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Open since 1831, Dublin Zoo spreads across 28 hectares of Phoenix Park. Its 400 animals span 100 species housed in distinct habitats — from the Gorilla Rainforest and Orangutan Forest to the African Savanna and Kaziranga Forest Trail. Founded in 1830 by Decimus Burton, its original animals were donated by London Zoo and the Royal Menagerie of the Tower of London.
What to look for
- The 1833 thatch-roofed entrance lodge — built for £30, it still stands to the right of the current entrance
- The range of named habitat zones: Wolves in the Woods, Zoorassic World, and Sea Lion Cove occupy the same grounds as the original Victorian gardens
- The lions — this breeding line was world-famous by the 1870s and drew post-presidential visits
Inside Phoenix Park; the zoo pulls over one million visitors a year, so plan for crowds on weekends and school breaks.
Dublin Zoo is one of 35 sights worth the detour in Dublin, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Dublin pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Dublin
- Aviva StadiumOne 51,711-seat bowl jointly owned by rugby and football — two governing bodies, one ground, no separate home for either.
- Dublin CastleThe river that gave Dublin its name still flows beneath your feet — and the building above it ran Ireland for 750 years.
- Croke ParkThe fourth-largest stadium in Europe holds 82,300 people — almost entirely for sports most of the world has never watched.
- National Library of IrelandIreland's paper memory — manuscripts, photographs, and newspapers free to open on the spot.
- St Patrick's CathedralIreland's national cathedral has never had a bishop — that role belongs to the rival church 400 metres up the road.
- Spire of DublinA 120-metre stainless-steel pin planted on the exact spot where an IRA bomb in 1966 — and a controlled demolition six days later — erased Nelson's Pillar.