Tripping, Part 3; Ireland

We took a two hour ferry ride from Scotland to Northern Ireland. After driving up to the North coast and checking into our B & B, we headed out to Giant's Causeway. We were able to spend about an hour climbing around the amazing rocks and enjoying the sound of the ocean and beautiful sunshine (notice no jackets!) .

"The Giant's Causeway is an area of about 40,000 interlocking basalt columns, the result of an ancient volcanic eruption. The tops of the columns form stepping stones that lead from the cliff foot and disappear under the sea. Most of the columns are hexagonal, although there are also some with four, five, seven and eight sides. The tallest are about 39 ft. high."

Then we drove further down the coast to experience going across the Carrick-de-Rede rope bridge. It spans 20 meters and is 30 meters above rocks and the ocean and goes out to a little island than was once used by fisherman. It was quite a thrill.

The view from the island was pretty spectacular also.

The next day, we went to Belfast where we toured the Parliament Building, the Botanical Garden and the Ulster Museum with the Book of Kells.

That evening we drove down to a town closer to Dublin and stayed in a hostel for the night.

We made a quick trip to the Hill of Tara..

"The Hill of Tara, known as Temair in Gaelic, was once the ancient seat of power in Ireland – 142 kings are said to have reigned there in prehistoric and historic times. In ancient Irish religion and mythology Temair was the sacred place of dwelling for the gods, and was the entrance to the otherworld. Saint Patrick is said to have come to Tara to confront the ancient religion of the pagans at its most powerful site." http://www.ancient-wisdom.co.uk/irelandtarahill.htm

Spent the next day in Dublin mostly riding the city tour bus and seeing the sights around town.

We found the Molly Malone statue was unveiled by Lord Mayor Benjamin Briscoe. (Not related but interesting.) A cute old guy was performing at the statue.

Jessica and I went out to walk on the peat but made a wrong turn and never found it. We got lost for a bit and had to go through some thick shrubbery but had a nice walk along the coast.

That evening we went to eat at a pub and listen to some live Irish music.

Attended church and then headed out to see some more of the countryside. Found a really nice cottage to stay in for the next three days outside of Kilkinney.

Monday morning we went down to Waterford but everything was closed due to a bank holiday. We finally found the crystal factory and were able to do a really interesting tour through.

Jessica shows off a world tennis championship trophy

Alyna with the Superbowl trophy

I found a really great piece that would look great in Dennis' office that I could have gotten him for Father's Day but he didn't want a $2000.00 crystal globe. Oh, well. It was a good offer.

We found a very picturesque bridge

Kilkinney Castle had closed before we got there but were able to get close.

It was still a fun place for a couple of pictures.

Ireland was a great place to visit and we got enough of a taste of it to know that it would be fun to return and spend more time. Now it's time to pack up and get ready to catch the ferry back to England and our flight to Germany.

Tripping, Part 2: On to Scotland

We did survive the KFC ordeal and woke up Monday morning ready to head to Scotland. We made a quick stop before we got to the border in the resort town of Winemere in order to see the famous (or not) ....

It was all booked up so we couldn't see inside but talked to the owners. The town was really interesting and picturesque. This house was about the narrowest house I've ever seen.

This big, beautiful building turned out to be some kind of church

- although it didn't look very churchy. It was fairly a typical look for the area.

There were all kinds of nice spots that worked great for photo shoots but

since they are mostly all of Alyna, this is the only one I will post.

While there we stayed in a nice little cottage on a farm near Loch Lommond. After the noise and business of London, it was a welcome change.

There were lots of sheep, which is probably why Scotland is famous for it's wool. It was very cool (as in damp and chilly) while we were there so we made a stop fairly early in our travels to buy some warm sweaters.

We spent 3 days seeing as many things as we could in Scotland.

Sunset on Loch Lommond. (About 10 PM)

Dennis and Jessica walked into an old castle ruins.

We hiked up to Bracklinn Falls, okay it was more of a walk, but there was a hill.

Then on to Stirling Castle, one of the largest and most important castles in Scotland. One of the historic events that occurred here was the crowning of Mary, Queen of Scots.

We drove over to see the Miekleour Beech Hedge which was planted in 1745 and is the world's tallest, averaging over 100 ft. tall and is 580 ft. long.

"The Queen's View" over Loch Tay. It wasn't a great time of day to try to take pictures of it but it was very picturesque.

Jessica has really liked old stone bridges lately

and we saw many interesting ones throughout our travels.

We went to tour the Duke and Duchess of Argyle's home. It was very interesting because they actually live in the home but let tours go through the more formal half of the house while they and their three young children live in the other half. Of course, for most of us, living in half of this house wouldn't be that great of a hardship.

In my next blog, we will board the ferry and head over to Northern Ireland.

Tripping is an Adventure

Going on a trip with Dennis is always an adventure. There is usually a pretty good chance you will do or see things that you never expect. Our current trip is no exception.

We flew from SLC to London by way of Detroit on Tuesday, May 24. We had a 8 hour layover in Detroit so rented a car and went to find a museum. Our first choice was closed due to renovations and the second was only open Wednesday thru Saturday. We ate lunch in Greek town and then we drove in search of a store to pick up some things we had already realized we forgot - Dennis' jeans and the power supply cord for Alyna's computer. Almost before we knew it we found ourselves in Canada.

We flew all night and arrived in London the next morning. We rented a car and headed out to visit the queen at Windsor castle.

After checking into our hotel - a Marriott that was right on the sight of a large horse racing venue - and taking a quick nap, we were off once again, in search of a good dinner.
We made a quick stop at the temple first and then drove to Brighton to see the Royal Pavillion. When it was finally to dark to see anything else very well, we went to a little Indian place and had a nice dinner.
The next day was a lot of driving, which in England, is not all that easy since everything is on the wrong side. But we made it to Stonehenge (it was rainy and I didn't even get out of the car but the girls got out for 5 minutes and ran and took a picture), Bath (where we spent the most time) and Bristol (where we mostly just dropped off packages to the missionaries) .

The inside of the clock of the cathedral

The Circus - Bath

Alyna writes a note to the Elders to leave with the packages.

The next few days we spent in London seeing the sights - Buckingham Palace, Westminster Cathedral, Big Ben, St. Paul's Cathedral, Tower of London and the London Bridge..... The town is looking much more spiffed up, whether it was for the royal wedding that took place last month or for next summer's Olympics, I'm not sure.

In front of Buckingham Palace

From the tower of St. Paul's Cathedral

Oh, we met a few famous people along the way.

We went to see a show each night - Phantom of the Opera and Wicked. I enjoyed them the second or third time as much as the first.

Sunday, we headed North. Dennis had a hard time staying awake so we had to find places to stop every two hours. We ended up going to Oxford, Stratford-Upon-Avon, the temple in Preston before getting to our hotel - a Marriott that looked like a large old country estate. We went to find something to eat and ended up in the down town part of town - not very nice - and getting meal at a KFC that was the most disgustingly filthy restaurant we had ever been in. We took the food back to our hotel, blessed it good and went to bed hoping that we all didn't have food poisoning.

More to come