It's funny but Christmas and Weddings are very much alike, generally people spend to much money on them and wonder why they did. The second thing is there is so much build up to it and then poof it's over. With that in mind and all the things that have happened in the last year, we decided to make it small and quiet. So for the first time in a very long time we did not have an open house on Christmas eve, we just had the four of us at dinner. It was quiet, it was relaxed and it was really nice to just hang with our children and enjoy the night. Christmas day has always been a little more low key in our house as Christmas eve was always the big night - so, just a couple of gifts under the tree (now that the kids are grown, they have very small lists) and a lovely breakfast cooked by Michael. Jessie cleaned the kitchen for me Christmas eve as part of my gift from her, Michael helped in that he loaded the dishwasher, but made it clear he would not be hand washing anything. It was pretty funny actually. For me the big gift was going to bed with a dirty kitchen and waking up to it magically clean. I can not go to bed knowing the dishes aren't getting done, drives me crazy. Funny thing is I don't think it used to bother me but it does now.
Today is Oretta's 81st birthday, so we wish her a wonderful day and wish that we were there with her. It's also, St. Stephen's day here in the Republic and Boxing Day in all the British locations. So a little history, St. Stephen was the first Martyr of the christian church and was martyrd on either December 26 or 27, his feast day is the 26th in the Western (Roman Catholic) Church and the 27th in the Eastern (Orthodox Catholic) Church. Traditionally, a box was placed in church on Christmas day and then gifts or money were put in it for the poor. Also, in the great houses, the staff always had to work christmas day, but would be given the next day off to celebrate their christmas with their families. In Ireland, St. Stephens day was celebrated with another tradition of "Wren Hunting". Boy's known as wren boys would go out on the 26th and hunt and kill a wren, then go around to houses with the wren on a pole singing for money. They killed the wren by stoning it to death which is how St. Stephen was killed.
Another interesting story we were told about Christmas in Ireland is about Christmas Eve Mass. Were were lamenting the fact that mass was only at 9:00 for the vigil, there was a polish mass offered at midnight, but not at our church. Our freinds told us it was because people would go to the pubs and show up at mass at the last second drunk, so the church decided to only offer the 9:00pm Vigil mass on Christmas eve and now everybody goes to the pub following Church.
Shannon Airport is closed on Christmas day so its lovely for us because we never have a worry of Adrian having to work on Christmas while we are here.
All in all a very nice and simple christmas that made us as happy as it made us sad. We miss everybody at home and were really glad to talk to all the family, but happy our children were here with us.
Till next time :) we posted a few pics on Flickr.
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Thursday, December 17, 2009
It's Christmas Time
First thing I want to say is I apologize because we did not send out cards this year. It just never seemed to work out. It has been some time since I last updated, but we have not been doing any traveling and have just been spending quiet time at home.
Jessie came home last Saturday and we are very excited to have her here. As many of you already know, Jessie has been accepted to Richmond American International University in London. This means she will be staying on this side of the world. Another thing that makes us very happy, because she will be close to us and we will be able to see here on more weekends and school breaks. Of course that assumes she will be willing to take time out of her busy schedule for us (jk, I know she will).
Michael won't arrive home until the 22nd, so we wait as patiently as possible for him. He will be staying through the 12th of January so that is pretty wonderful in our minds.
We miss everybody at home a great deal and think of you all quite often, but especially at Christmas. We have definately been blessed with the life we have been granted. We wish everyone a very happy season and a very succesful new year.
Keep well!
Jessie came home last Saturday and we are very excited to have her here. As many of you already know, Jessie has been accepted to Richmond American International University in London. This means she will be staying on this side of the world. Another thing that makes us very happy, because she will be close to us and we will be able to see here on more weekends and school breaks. Of course that assumes she will be willing to take time out of her busy schedule for us (jk, I know she will).
Michael won't arrive home until the 22nd, so we wait as patiently as possible for him. He will be staying through the 12th of January so that is pretty wonderful in our minds.
We miss everybody at home a great deal and think of you all quite often, but especially at Christmas. We have definately been blessed with the life we have been granted. We wish everyone a very happy season and a very succesful new year.
Keep well!
Friday, October 16, 2009
Aaaah France
I have to say I am in love with France. Four glorious days in Brittany. The people are amazingly freindly, the weather was perfect and of course as always the food spectacular. I even drank wine and did not break out in hives so it was a really nice trip. The regional wine is Muscadel, a little drier than I actually like, but a very nice hint of sweetness to it. I even had a glass of red wine our last night in France and it was really good, very smooth and not bitter at all. Can't remember the name of it though.
First, a little history of Brittany, it encompases a rather large area of France, that is made up of 6 what I would call counties (no idea what the french call them). The Northern Finistre, Southern Finistre, Cotes D'Amor, Ille-et-Vilaine, Morbihan and the Loire Atlantique. It does not seem to take more the 2 hours to get to anywhere in the region. Called Brittany or Petit Britagne because "Amorica" (the Roman name for the area), was mostly taken over and settled by Celts from Gran Britagne or the Island of Great Britan, during the 6th Century so like 500AD. From then until the 10th century it was known as Britannia and was a seperate country from Frankish Gaul (the rest of France). In 103 John Lackland of England murdered the son of the current ruler of Brittany and it fell under the rule of the English King. Then the daughter or sister of who would be ruler of Brittany (Alix) married a French prince, Pierre de Dreux and Brittany became a royal fiefdom. In 1297 Philip the Fair, King of the Franks made Brittany ad vassal-duchy and the ducal government reigned as such until Anne the last dukes daughter was forced to marry Charles VIII king of France on December 6 1491. After he died she married the next king Louis XII and so was twice Queen of France. She managed to protect her Duchy as queen but it was still incorporated into the Country of France. That's the brief ancient history of the region.
Ok, so on to the trip itself. I give you an overview of the trip and then the pictures will have the really detailed descriptions of what things were! And of course you know me it will be way more than anyone really wants to know about these places and the things we saw. We only saw a minuet amount of what there is to see and do in the region and a true trip should take 2-3 weeks. Of course, just means we need to go back.
We managed to spend only 22.00 euro round trip for both tickets. Ya gotta love when Ryanair runs the no cost specials, all you end up paying is taxes and of course the checked bag fee.
We landed first in Nantes, had a lovely room in a B&B that looked out at the Ducal palace. Strolled over to the Cathedral and then through the old town. Nantes old town was very lively there were tons of people out strolling, shopping and having drinks or coffees at the sidewalk cafes. Nantes is in the Loire Atlantique region it was the capitol of the Dukes of Brittany and is the largest city in Western France and is the capital of the Pays de la Loire. The reason to visit Nantes is the old town, containing the Cathedral, the Ducal Palace and the Pasage Pommeraye shopping mall in the old town. You could do Nantes in one day, which is what we did and that was plenty, we even got to attend mass in the cathedral which was lovely, even if we could not understand it. There is also a Jules Verne museum in Nantes unfortunately it was not open when we were there. After mass and visiting the Ducal Palace on Sunday, we drove to Rennes.
Rennes a place that you don't need more than a day at in my opinion. It may be because it was Sunday, it may be because the tourist season was over, but Rennes just did not have the energy and feel that Nantes did for me. Part of the problem may lie in the fact that over 90% of the city was destroyed during the liberation in WWII. We did a street by street walk in the old town and there was a run going on so many of the streets were shut down. The only building we got to go in was the Cathedral. There were many very lovely old buildings in Rennes historic quarter that were spared or reproduced after the was as you will see from the picture. We spent the night in Rennes and Monday morning got up with no hotel planned for the night to see where we got during the day.
From Rennes we drove through the Ille and up to Mont St. Michel, if you never see anything else in this area a visit to the Mont is a must. We arrived at about 10:00am and spend the next 5 hours exploring the Mont. Today the Mont is technically in Normandy because the course of the River changed its flow, but tradittionally the Mont is part of Brittany. The Mont was originally known as Mont-Tombe, and a small "oratory" was built there in the 8the century. The abbey was begun in the 10th century and by the 16th doublde the height of the Mont. The main street in the village running up to the abbey is of course very touristy, but it makes arrival and touring of the abbey that much more enjoyable. Our guide in the Abbey told us that in the summer months 4.5 million people come to the Mont and about half of that comes up to tour the abbey. Our hotelier in St. Malo told us that in June and July, the abbey closes early then opens back up from 7-9pm for special evening tours that include traditional or classical music and the abbey is lit with candles. Something we would definately like to do given the opportunity. After having a very nice lunch in one of the restaurants on the village street we headed off, made a breif stop - drive through of Pleugenec, the village our cousin Monique is from. Very pretty village - but then all of Brittany was very pretty in my mind. Stopped in Dinan and walked around a bit, again, very quiet when we were there and even though it was Monday afternoon around 4pm, many of the shops were closed. Met a very nice shopkeeper though on the square who let me use his phone to book a room in Cancale for the night. Drove on to Cancale, supposed to be the best oysters anywhere. Adrian said its true and he had 12 as his starter for dinner. Our room looked out over the ocean which in theory was nice, but it was very busy and we were at the end of the port so at 5:30am when it was time to pull in oysters from the beds it got very noisy. Still beautiful though. After a lovely breakfast we headed out for the day.
Saint Malo, we drove straight through to here and arrived at approximatley 11am. One day is not nearly enough for this my favorite of all the places we saw. I would suggest spending 3 days here and driving to Mont Saint Michel from here as a day trip. Saint Malo was a monk from Wales his name was Mac Low. At the end of the 17th century it was Frances most important port. Again during the liberation of WWII much of this beautiful city was bombed. The government was really smart and some of the historical sites that had been destroyed were recreated exactly sometimes even using the same stones they were originally built with. The feel is then of a very old walled city. After checking in to Elizabeth Hotel, just inside the walls of the city. We took a walk along the walls, the views are beautiful and spectacular. I loved the feel of the city and the fact that you could walk around all the walls in just a couple of short hours. We had lunch at a restaurant right across from the Citadel - my first meal of the amazing mussels and chips lunch that is very popular in the region. Yum Yum is all I can say. Then took a tour through the Musee du Britagne. Small and very quaint, more info to follow on the pictures. Wandered around some of the old areas visited the cathedral and the church of St. Malo, then had a lovely dinner back by the Citadel. Saint Malo is known as the Corsair, city because most of its fame and wealth came from privateers i.e. Pirates. It boasts several famous sons one of which was the discoverer of Canada and the St. Laurence river. Jacques Cartier. They made on of their pirates Robert Surcouf a hero because he destroyed a large english ship during one of the attacks on the city. Wednesday morning we got up and headed back to Nantes via some lovely places.
First stop Paimpont where we had a quick lunch and then through the forest of Paimpont to try and find Merlin's tomb. We weren't very successful, nor did we actually see the "fountain of britagne" a fountain of youth. We were a little dissapointed because we were both surprised to find that there were links with the Arthurian legends and the knights of the round table in France at all. It was an area of history we were both lacking in and will require further study. After our drive through the forest we headed off to Carnac and all the standing stones in the area. That was an amazing sight to see. By this time it was 5:00 and time to head toward the Nantes airport for our final night as our flight left first thing Thursday morning.
I would really like to make another trip or two to this region as there is still so much we did not see and I was very sad to leave.
Hope you enjoy all the photos Adrian took!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
First, a little history of Brittany, it encompases a rather large area of France, that is made up of 6 what I would call counties (no idea what the french call them). The Northern Finistre, Southern Finistre, Cotes D'Amor, Ille-et-Vilaine, Morbihan and the Loire Atlantique. It does not seem to take more the 2 hours to get to anywhere in the region. Called Brittany or Petit Britagne because "Amorica" (the Roman name for the area), was mostly taken over and settled by Celts from Gran Britagne or the Island of Great Britan, during the 6th Century so like 500AD. From then until the 10th century it was known as Britannia and was a seperate country from Frankish Gaul (the rest of France). In 103 John Lackland of England murdered the son of the current ruler of Brittany and it fell under the rule of the English King. Then the daughter or sister of who would be ruler of Brittany (Alix) married a French prince, Pierre de Dreux and Brittany became a royal fiefdom. In 1297 Philip the Fair, King of the Franks made Brittany ad vassal-duchy and the ducal government reigned as such until Anne the last dukes daughter was forced to marry Charles VIII king of France on December 6 1491. After he died she married the next king Louis XII and so was twice Queen of France. She managed to protect her Duchy as queen but it was still incorporated into the Country of France. That's the brief ancient history of the region.
Ok, so on to the trip itself. I give you an overview of the trip and then the pictures will have the really detailed descriptions of what things were! And of course you know me it will be way more than anyone really wants to know about these places and the things we saw. We only saw a minuet amount of what there is to see and do in the region and a true trip should take 2-3 weeks. Of course, just means we need to go back.
We managed to spend only 22.00 euro round trip for both tickets. Ya gotta love when Ryanair runs the no cost specials, all you end up paying is taxes and of course the checked bag fee.
We landed first in Nantes, had a lovely room in a B&B that looked out at the Ducal palace. Strolled over to the Cathedral and then through the old town. Nantes old town was very lively there were tons of people out strolling, shopping and having drinks or coffees at the sidewalk cafes. Nantes is in the Loire Atlantique region it was the capitol of the Dukes of Brittany and is the largest city in Western France and is the capital of the Pays de la Loire. The reason to visit Nantes is the old town, containing the Cathedral, the Ducal Palace and the Pasage Pommeraye shopping mall in the old town. You could do Nantes in one day, which is what we did and that was plenty, we even got to attend mass in the cathedral which was lovely, even if we could not understand it. There is also a Jules Verne museum in Nantes unfortunately it was not open when we were there. After mass and visiting the Ducal Palace on Sunday, we drove to Rennes.
Rennes a place that you don't need more than a day at in my opinion. It may be because it was Sunday, it may be because the tourist season was over, but Rennes just did not have the energy and feel that Nantes did for me. Part of the problem may lie in the fact that over 90% of the city was destroyed during the liberation in WWII. We did a street by street walk in the old town and there was a run going on so many of the streets were shut down. The only building we got to go in was the Cathedral. There were many very lovely old buildings in Rennes historic quarter that were spared or reproduced after the was as you will see from the picture. We spent the night in Rennes and Monday morning got up with no hotel planned for the night to see where we got during the day.
From Rennes we drove through the Ille and up to Mont St. Michel, if you never see anything else in this area a visit to the Mont is a must. We arrived at about 10:00am and spend the next 5 hours exploring the Mont. Today the Mont is technically in Normandy because the course of the River changed its flow, but tradittionally the Mont is part of Brittany. The Mont was originally known as Mont-Tombe, and a small "oratory" was built there in the 8the century. The abbey was begun in the 10th century and by the 16th doublde the height of the Mont. The main street in the village running up to the abbey is of course very touristy, but it makes arrival and touring of the abbey that much more enjoyable. Our guide in the Abbey told us that in the summer months 4.5 million people come to the Mont and about half of that comes up to tour the abbey. Our hotelier in St. Malo told us that in June and July, the abbey closes early then opens back up from 7-9pm for special evening tours that include traditional or classical music and the abbey is lit with candles. Something we would definately like to do given the opportunity. After having a very nice lunch in one of the restaurants on the village street we headed off, made a breif stop - drive through of Pleugenec, the village our cousin Monique is from. Very pretty village - but then all of Brittany was very pretty in my mind. Stopped in Dinan and walked around a bit, again, very quiet when we were there and even though it was Monday afternoon around 4pm, many of the shops were closed. Met a very nice shopkeeper though on the square who let me use his phone to book a room in Cancale for the night. Drove on to Cancale, supposed to be the best oysters anywhere. Adrian said its true and he had 12 as his starter for dinner. Our room looked out over the ocean which in theory was nice, but it was very busy and we were at the end of the port so at 5:30am when it was time to pull in oysters from the beds it got very noisy. Still beautiful though. After a lovely breakfast we headed out for the day.
Saint Malo, we drove straight through to here and arrived at approximatley 11am. One day is not nearly enough for this my favorite of all the places we saw. I would suggest spending 3 days here and driving to Mont Saint Michel from here as a day trip. Saint Malo was a monk from Wales his name was Mac Low. At the end of the 17th century it was Frances most important port. Again during the liberation of WWII much of this beautiful city was bombed. The government was really smart and some of the historical sites that had been destroyed were recreated exactly sometimes even using the same stones they were originally built with. The feel is then of a very old walled city. After checking in to Elizabeth Hotel, just inside the walls of the city. We took a walk along the walls, the views are beautiful and spectacular. I loved the feel of the city and the fact that you could walk around all the walls in just a couple of short hours. We had lunch at a restaurant right across from the Citadel - my first meal of the amazing mussels and chips lunch that is very popular in the region. Yum Yum is all I can say. Then took a tour through the Musee du Britagne. Small and very quaint, more info to follow on the pictures. Wandered around some of the old areas visited the cathedral and the church of St. Malo, then had a lovely dinner back by the Citadel. Saint Malo is known as the Corsair, city because most of its fame and wealth came from privateers i.e. Pirates. It boasts several famous sons one of which was the discoverer of Canada and the St. Laurence river. Jacques Cartier. They made on of their pirates Robert Surcouf a hero because he destroyed a large english ship during one of the attacks on the city. Wednesday morning we got up and headed back to Nantes via some lovely places.
First stop Paimpont where we had a quick lunch and then through the forest of Paimpont to try and find Merlin's tomb. We weren't very successful, nor did we actually see the "fountain of britagne" a fountain of youth. We were a little dissapointed because we were both surprised to find that there were links with the Arthurian legends and the knights of the round table in France at all. It was an area of history we were both lacking in and will require further study. After our drive through the forest we headed off to Carnac and all the standing stones in the area. That was an amazing sight to see. By this time it was 5:00 and time to head toward the Nantes airport for our final night as our flight left first thing Thursday morning.
I would really like to make another trip or two to this region as there is still so much we did not see and I was very sad to leave.
Hope you enjoy all the photos Adrian took!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
Monday, September 21, 2009
Of negligence, Mice and London
So I must admit, since becoming Facebook addicted I have not really kept up with my blog. For this I sincerely apologize. So, the negligence in the title is mine for ignoring all of my friends and family who follow our adventures here in Ireland. Of mice, just before I left for a week in Dallas, I saw a mouse run out of my chimney. Prior to that when my niece was here she had seen some droppings in her bedroom when we came back from London. Learned tonight, that's probably where the mouse came in, through her open window. So, I take off for a week, having informed the husband that there is a mouse in the house. He tells me over the phone while I am gone, that he still has done nothing about it and... hmm, said mouse has now ripped some of the insulation out from under the dishwasher. Said mess is left for me to clean up when I arrive home (men). Today, I spoke with our landlord and he said, oh just run up to the house Marie will give you a couple of traps. Ok, this I can do, so I tell Adrian and we stop on our way back from the grocery store - she's not home. I figure no big deal, I can resolve tomorrow it's ok. So after doing the dinner dishes I sit on the Sofa in the family room to needlepoint and oh look there's a history channel special about the plague lets watch. (Get it, plague, rats, mice...) I realize that I can not find the piece of paper with my color instruction for the piece I am working on. So I start moving things around, including a blanket we have on the sofa, but look, there appear to be holes in the blanket, and wait is that what I think it is on the cushion. Yes it is, it is mouse dropping and chewed up paper. I go up stairs to get the vacuum, while Adrian starts removing the cushions. I am back down stairs as he lifts the cushion that the mouse is under. It runs along the back of the sofa, I jump on a chair. I am not doing this I say, and get in the car and drive back up to Marie's to see if she is home yet. 3 traps secured, she also kindly provided me with rasher fat to put on the traps. They are set and am hoping that in the morning we will see some positive results.
London, as many of you know Jessie is off in London doing a semester abroad, she has called home a couple of times and we have im'd back and forth. She indicated her home stay is different and promises to send pictures but will say no more about it. The house is incredibly quiet without her, but she'll be back in another 2.5 months, so I think I can hand. If I have not provided you with her address there email me and I will give it to you. So far her only major drawback is that she will turn 21 while there and of course that is no big deal in Europe with respect to drinking etc. Oh well the price one has to pay for a superior education.
I think that is about it for now, but will try to be better about keeping you all up to date. Oh one more thing, my Aunt Marilynn is very ill and I would appreciate it if you all kept her in your prayers. Thinking of everyone always!
London, as many of you know Jessie is off in London doing a semester abroad, she has called home a couple of times and we have im'd back and forth. She indicated her home stay is different and promises to send pictures but will say no more about it. The house is incredibly quiet without her, but she'll be back in another 2.5 months, so I think I can hand. If I have not provided you with her address there email me and I will give it to you. So far her only major drawback is that she will turn 21 while there and of course that is no big deal in Europe with respect to drinking etc. Oh well the price one has to pay for a superior education.
I think that is about it for now, but will try to be better about keeping you all up to date. Oh one more thing, my Aunt Marilynn is very ill and I would appreciate it if you all kept her in your prayers. Thinking of everyone always!
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
No American Phone
So I am in Dallas working and won't be home before Friday. Adrian apparently broke hte vonage machine and I wont be able to request a new one until I get home. If there is an emergency please call us at +353-061-476-980.
Also, I want to take a minute to Thank those of you who have been in the loop recently with our struggles and have been such a tremendous support to us. If you don't know what I am talking about we aren't sharing but life is all good.
Hope you are well.
Also, I want to take a minute to Thank those of you who have been in the loop recently with our struggles and have been such a tremendous support to us. If you don't know what I am talking about we aren't sharing but life is all good.
Hope you are well.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
July
So, as usual lately I am very delayed in getting this out - already a week into August and I haven't done an update since Vienna.
We came home from Vienna and a few days later the Concord Scaletti's came in for two days - it was great to see them, we were just sorry that Antonio wasn't able to make this trip. They got safely off to Italy and my sister and niece arrived for a 2.5 week stay.
We had a lovely time, went around to a few places tried to see somethings I hadn't done here yet, like the inside of Knappogue Castle. We went off to London for two days as well and had a lovely visit. I broke my camera (typical) so had to steal photo's from JoeAnne, Kathi and Jessie.
Just before they left our friends the Minetto's came up from Kerry for a couple of just hang out days, we haven't seen them in years, so it was wonderful to catch up with them and now I am enjoying the down time.
We picked up another car so now I have transportation when Adrian is at work and don't have to get up at the crack of dawn if I need a car. That's the best news.
Hope you all enjoy the sites. Will try to do better at keeping up.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
We came home from Vienna and a few days later the Concord Scaletti's came in for two days - it was great to see them, we were just sorry that Antonio wasn't able to make this trip. They got safely off to Italy and my sister and niece arrived for a 2.5 week stay.
We had a lovely time, went around to a few places tried to see somethings I hadn't done here yet, like the inside of Knappogue Castle. We went off to London for two days as well and had a lovely visit. I broke my camera (typical) so had to steal photo's from JoeAnne, Kathi and Jessie.
Just before they left our friends the Minetto's came up from Kerry for a couple of just hang out days, we haven't seen them in years, so it was wonderful to catch up with them and now I am enjoying the down time.
We picked up another car so now I have transportation when Adrian is at work and don't have to get up at the crack of dawn if I need a car. That's the best news.
Hope you all enjoy the sites. Will try to do better at keeping up.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
Friday, July 10, 2009
Vienna
July 3, 2009
We arrived in Vienna around 3:00pm after flying from Gatwick airport in London a couple of trains and subway rides brought us right into the city. Checked into our room at the hotel and walked around a little bit. We stopped into the royal crypt at the Capuchin Church. Unfortunately not too many of the pictures came out, but it was amazing there are 12 emperors, 17 empresses and multiple other royal family members. Oh and the nanny to Maria Theresia (the most famous of the Hapsburgs, and Marie Antoinette’s mother). Finally, we had some dinner and went to bed, very quiet and easy first day.
July 4, 2009
Happy Independence Day America, we started the morning with a tour of the Opera house. They perform 50 opera’s per season, seven days a week. The season lasts from August until June. They perform a different opera every night. The theater can seat 2,000 people and in February they take out the main seating lift the floor even with the stage and turn the Opera House into a giant ballroom. This is the annual State Ball, hosting 5,000 people. Part of the Opera house was destroyed during the bombings of WWII, so some areas are new and some are old. The Opera was first opened in the 1860’s and rumor has it that the emperor Franz Joseph likened it to a train station, causing architect Eduard van der Null to commit suicide. I don’t know if it’s true, but it was certainly amazing to see and spectacular in many ways.
Following our tour of the Opera we went to the Hofburg (the palace), to see the Imperial Apartments, the Treasury and the Silver and China department. We started with the Silver and China area, this consisted of multiple rooms and an enormous amount of silver, gilt pieces and porcelain, it was an amazing and mind boggling sight. Then we moved over to the imperial apartments that had been occupied by Franz Joseph and Elisabeth. Elisabeth is the most loved and in all her paintings we must admit she was quite the looker. In mine and Jessie’s opinion, she was a whiner and was probably a manic depressive or bi-polar. At any rate the Viennese absolutely love her and there is great legend surrounding her. They call her Sisi and she was amazing and beautiful. The apartments were great to see and they were quite lovely. Throughout our visit here we have been unable to take pictures in some of the palaces and were not allowed to take photographs in the imperial apartments. Then we went over to the treasury where we did get to take some photographs. Got to see Charlemagne’s crown and a holy spear, which at one time was believed to have been part of the “spear of Longinus”. It has been disproved as that spear as much of the metal has been dated to the 13-14th century.
We happened upon some riders from the Spanish riding school and the Hofburg marching band, those were great fun to stumble upon.
July 5, 2009
Adrian had us get up at the crazy hour of 6:30am to catch a bus and train to the city of Krems, because he had read that it was a village well worth walking around and seeing. Of course, today being Sunday……it is Europe after all and Austria still has a strong religious feel to it. After getting a bite to eat and wandering around the town for a bit, we went down to catch the Ferry for a cruise on the “Blue Danube”. Yeah, the river is a very muddy brown and reminds me in many ways of the Mississippi. The cruise was gorgeous and the scenery along the river wonderful, after 3 hours you arrive in the village (town) of Melk, where there is an amazing Benedictine Abbey. We toured the abbey and as you will see by the pictures, the Monks are quite spoiled. At least that’s what Jessie says. It is incredibly ornate and large. We determined that the Benedictines clearly never took a vow of poverty. Then we caught the train back to Vienna. Off and on all day we managed to miss the rain, which apparently came down quite hard at times. But it never really stayed long enough to cool things off for any length of time. When we got back into the city of Vienna, we had lots of time so we decided we would do the hop on hop off bus tour. It was halted halfway through because of the “Pride Parade” we can now say that we have managed to see it in 4 countries; Italy, France, USA, and Austria. Not sure how we always manage to time our trips to pride but we do. So we walked through the end zone of the festivities and got to see a little of the parade. We had dinner at the old Palm house, which was the Hothouse for the Hofburg.
July 6, 2009
We got up and went to Schonbrunn Palace today; this was the summer palace of the Hapsburgs and was meant to rival Versailles. Doesn’t get mine and Jessie’s vote – we still like Versailles better, but it was pretty spectacular and had lots to see and do. We started out touring the rooms in the palace that the public are allowed into. One of the rooms belonged to Marie Antoinette. I can’t remember if she was born at the Hofburg or Schonbrunn. There was a room in the palace called the millions room, because it cost that much to decorate. One of the really amazing and cool things about the Viennese palaces is, instead of fireplaces in all the rooms, they had ceramic stoves in the corners and these stoves heated the entire room. There was a passage way behind the walls and that’s how the stoves were loaded with their wood, etc. The gardens at Schonbrunn were beautiful and we walked up to the top where there is a café and you could have lunch. Then we went to the palaces zoo, they had an amazing zoo and it is supposedly the oldest in the world having been started as a menagerie in the 1700’s. As we were just finishing up the zoo and heading to the carriage museum the skies opened up and it was pouring. We darted into the gift shop and bought umbrellas and ponchos. We were soaked by the time we made it to the carriage house. We did our tour of the carriage house, again no picture taking was allowed. When we were done with that tour it had stopped raining and we walked over to the bakery where we watched a presentation on making Apfelstruddel, (i.e. Apple Strudel). This came with a free taste – it was lovely – bought the recipe book and will definitely be making some at home. We came out to catch the subway back to our end of town and it was pouring again. There was some wonderful Thunder and Lightening to go along with the rain showers. We grabbed some take away (pizza and kebap food) so we could go back to our room and dry out. After some dinner and the rain stopping we ventured back out to the Hotel Sacher for the “Original Sacher Torte”. It’s very rich and yummy cake that’s made here. The pastries and breads are amazing here.
July 7, 2009
Today we got to sleep in – 8:00am wake up. Actually, Adrian and I were up at 8:00am, he went off for a long walk, while I jumped in the shower. At 9:30 he still was not back so I got Jessie up and we went down for breakfast. He joined us about 9:45am; once his breakfast was over we meandered over to the Hofburg. We had tickets for an 11:00a.m morning exercise display at the “Spanish Riding School”. This is where the Lipizzaner stallions are trained and shown. We had been told that it would only be a 1 hour exercise show of the young horses and mares, because the stallions are off in the summer pastures enjoying a holiday. However, we got lucky, they not only did some showing of antique imperial carriages and the horses that pull them, but brought in some of the 3 year old colts from the pastures (they start training the stallions at 3.5 years of age). And they brought in some of the mares and their new foals. It was a wonderful show and we learned lots of interesting things. One of which was that all of the Lipizzaner are dark until they are about 6 years old, that’s when they fade to their grey or white color.
Searching out some lunch at what appeared to be less of a tourist place and more of a local hangout. Lunch was fantastic I had amazing Goulash soooo yummy. We headed over to the Neu Burg (new palace) to see the arms and armor museum. Of course, they are closed on Tuesdays, so we headed over to the Natural History Museum; oh they’re closed for renovation. So, we found our way to the most amazing outdoor market. I truly wish we had something along those lines in Ireland where we are living. The fruits and veg were so incredible. We bought some raviolis and pesto to bring back to our apartment to cook for dinner with pesto. Mm its ok, the pesto is a little strong but the raviolis themselves were ok. Found some very delicious bread to go with it.
July 8, 2009
Today our last day in Vienna, Adrian arranged for us to go on a sightseeing tour of the “Vienna Woods”. There were three stops on the tour. The first stop was at Mayerling, currently a nunnery and small chapel, formerly a hunting lodge belonging to the Crown Prince Rudolph. He was Sissi and Franz Joseph’s only son and apparently committed “murder suicide, killing his 17 year old mistress and himself. He was 31 when he died. Although the story is interesting there isn’t really anything to see in this site, you get to see the original coffin his mistress was buried in and a room with some pictures and a copy of his suicide note. They rush you through the place in about 15 minutes, but I believe it is how the Carmelite’s there support themselves, because they have a tour running through every 15 minutes. From there we went to a Cistercian Monastery, still monks living and working there, 61 to be exact. That was beautiful and the tour was very informative. The Church of the monastery also holds the remains of the Babenberg rulers who came before the Hapsburgs. The final stop on the tour was the Hinterbruhl Bei Wien Seegrotte. So, Hinterbrhul Bei Wien means Hinterbrhul in Vienna and Seegrotte is an underground lake. The lake was created in an old Gypsum Mine. In 1912, one of the tunnels in the lowest level of the mine collapsed and 20,000,000 liters of water flooded the entire level, from then the mine was shut down. In 1932 it was reopened as a display mine for tourists. In 1944 a subterranean airplane factory was established in the mine and some 2000 workers, many from the concentration camps constructed the first jet fighters there. In 1945 the Germans demolished the mine and factory. And later was reclaimed by the Austrian Republic and finally reopened as a tourist attraction. Now in order to keep the mine open as a tourist attraction and the level of the lake steady water must be pumped out nightly. There are 7 natural springs bringing the water into the lake which has no natural outflow. Nothing lives in the water and it is amazingly clear. There is a dragon standing near the boat dock when you get there for your ride on the lake. It is leftover from the last production of the Musketeers’ movie with Keifer Sutherland.
We came out of the mine had a hot dog, which means two long frankfurters on a plate with spicy brown mustard. If you want a hot dog in a bun in Austria, you must order a frankfurter. It’s very interesting. Then the bus ride back into the city of Vienna. As we were back into the city by 3:00pm we felt we had time to go to the Arms and Armor Museum which had been closed the day before. It was amazing and overwhelming, I wondered at one point how much armor one man could have really needed as many of the suits belonged to Maximillian I. It was crazy, but a very cool display, housed in the same museum was a collection of ancient and semi modern musical instruments and a collection from the digs at Ephesus. When we left the museum, I realized that it was only 4:45 and we would be passing the Spanish Riding School. One of the things they had told us the day of our show was that they had set up a “meadow” in the courtyard of the stables and every afternoon at 5:00pm they led the mares and their foals into it so they could still feel they were out at Piber. So we stayed to watch the foals and their mares and got some great shots of them playing. For our last dinner in Vienna we went in search of…..Italian food. Yes, we feel compelled to find Italian food in every city we visit. It was good food not spectacular.
July 9, 2009
As our flight did not leave until 1:00pm we got up, had some breakfast, and took a final walk around the city. Stopped into the Swarovski store, they are headquartered in Vienna. Did you know that OPEC is also headquartered in Vienna? The weather had been lovely for this trip and we had a very good 6 days.
Things I loved about Vienna, Wiener schnitzel, Ice Cream, Coffee, Hot dogs, Goulash, the look and feel of the city and the weather. Things I did not love about Vienna, it’s very expensive even by EU standards, and some of the people were rude not a lot though. And airport security was crazy, we went through 3 different check points Boarding card and ID were checked at the first 2, with your picture being taken at the 2nd location. Then you went through x-ray portion right at your gate, which did not seem so bad, until they changed the gate and you had to do so all over again. That was crazy. However, I think it was by far the easiest airport to go through security.
When we got to Gatwick, they seemed to have some new security procedures in place; they also took our picture when they checked our boarding pass and passport. When we got to the next step where you take your computer out etc., walk through the machine, it beeped for virtually every person who walked through, so you got a pat down. Then separately we took your shoes off and walked through again at a second location, all they were scanning at this location was the shoes. When we got to our gate, we went through a further checkpoint and that actually brought up the picture that had been taken at the first check point. Then we stepped over to yet another attendant who took our pass and checked our passport one more time. As we boarded the plane the attendant there had to sign our remaining half of the boarding pass. It was very crazy and we looked to see if anything had happened since we had left the week before, as we did not go through all of this last Thursday, but nothing. It was the most screening we had ever been through.
So, that’s it for now the Scaletti’s arrive tomorrow and my niece and sister Next week.
Enjoy the pictures.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/3713030420/
We arrived in Vienna around 3:00pm after flying from Gatwick airport in London a couple of trains and subway rides brought us right into the city. Checked into our room at the hotel and walked around a little bit. We stopped into the royal crypt at the Capuchin Church. Unfortunately not too many of the pictures came out, but it was amazing there are 12 emperors, 17 empresses and multiple other royal family members. Oh and the nanny to Maria Theresia (the most famous of the Hapsburgs, and Marie Antoinette’s mother). Finally, we had some dinner and went to bed, very quiet and easy first day.
July 4, 2009
Happy Independence Day America, we started the morning with a tour of the Opera house. They perform 50 opera’s per season, seven days a week. The season lasts from August until June. They perform a different opera every night. The theater can seat 2,000 people and in February they take out the main seating lift the floor even with the stage and turn the Opera House into a giant ballroom. This is the annual State Ball, hosting 5,000 people. Part of the Opera house was destroyed during the bombings of WWII, so some areas are new and some are old. The Opera was first opened in the 1860’s and rumor has it that the emperor Franz Joseph likened it to a train station, causing architect Eduard van der Null to commit suicide. I don’t know if it’s true, but it was certainly amazing to see and spectacular in many ways.
Following our tour of the Opera we went to the Hofburg (the palace), to see the Imperial Apartments, the Treasury and the Silver and China department. We started with the Silver and China area, this consisted of multiple rooms and an enormous amount of silver, gilt pieces and porcelain, it was an amazing and mind boggling sight. Then we moved over to the imperial apartments that had been occupied by Franz Joseph and Elisabeth. Elisabeth is the most loved and in all her paintings we must admit she was quite the looker. In mine and Jessie’s opinion, she was a whiner and was probably a manic depressive or bi-polar. At any rate the Viennese absolutely love her and there is great legend surrounding her. They call her Sisi and she was amazing and beautiful. The apartments were great to see and they were quite lovely. Throughout our visit here we have been unable to take pictures in some of the palaces and were not allowed to take photographs in the imperial apartments. Then we went over to the treasury where we did get to take some photographs. Got to see Charlemagne’s crown and a holy spear, which at one time was believed to have been part of the “spear of Longinus”. It has been disproved as that spear as much of the metal has been dated to the 13-14th century.
We happened upon some riders from the Spanish riding school and the Hofburg marching band, those were great fun to stumble upon.
July 5, 2009
Adrian had us get up at the crazy hour of 6:30am to catch a bus and train to the city of Krems, because he had read that it was a village well worth walking around and seeing. Of course, today being Sunday……it is Europe after all and Austria still has a strong religious feel to it. After getting a bite to eat and wandering around the town for a bit, we went down to catch the Ferry for a cruise on the “Blue Danube”. Yeah, the river is a very muddy brown and reminds me in many ways of the Mississippi. The cruise was gorgeous and the scenery along the river wonderful, after 3 hours you arrive in the village (town) of Melk, where there is an amazing Benedictine Abbey. We toured the abbey and as you will see by the pictures, the Monks are quite spoiled. At least that’s what Jessie says. It is incredibly ornate and large. We determined that the Benedictines clearly never took a vow of poverty. Then we caught the train back to Vienna. Off and on all day we managed to miss the rain, which apparently came down quite hard at times. But it never really stayed long enough to cool things off for any length of time. When we got back into the city of Vienna, we had lots of time so we decided we would do the hop on hop off bus tour. It was halted halfway through because of the “Pride Parade” we can now say that we have managed to see it in 4 countries; Italy, France, USA, and Austria. Not sure how we always manage to time our trips to pride but we do. So we walked through the end zone of the festivities and got to see a little of the parade. We had dinner at the old Palm house, which was the Hothouse for the Hofburg.
July 6, 2009
We got up and went to Schonbrunn Palace today; this was the summer palace of the Hapsburgs and was meant to rival Versailles. Doesn’t get mine and Jessie’s vote – we still like Versailles better, but it was pretty spectacular and had lots to see and do. We started out touring the rooms in the palace that the public are allowed into. One of the rooms belonged to Marie Antoinette. I can’t remember if she was born at the Hofburg or Schonbrunn. There was a room in the palace called the millions room, because it cost that much to decorate. One of the really amazing and cool things about the Viennese palaces is, instead of fireplaces in all the rooms, they had ceramic stoves in the corners and these stoves heated the entire room. There was a passage way behind the walls and that’s how the stoves were loaded with their wood, etc. The gardens at Schonbrunn were beautiful and we walked up to the top where there is a café and you could have lunch. Then we went to the palaces zoo, they had an amazing zoo and it is supposedly the oldest in the world having been started as a menagerie in the 1700’s. As we were just finishing up the zoo and heading to the carriage museum the skies opened up and it was pouring. We darted into the gift shop and bought umbrellas and ponchos. We were soaked by the time we made it to the carriage house. We did our tour of the carriage house, again no picture taking was allowed. When we were done with that tour it had stopped raining and we walked over to the bakery where we watched a presentation on making Apfelstruddel, (i.e. Apple Strudel). This came with a free taste – it was lovely – bought the recipe book and will definitely be making some at home. We came out to catch the subway back to our end of town and it was pouring again. There was some wonderful Thunder and Lightening to go along with the rain showers. We grabbed some take away (pizza and kebap food) so we could go back to our room and dry out. After some dinner and the rain stopping we ventured back out to the Hotel Sacher for the “Original Sacher Torte”. It’s very rich and yummy cake that’s made here. The pastries and breads are amazing here.
July 7, 2009
Today we got to sleep in – 8:00am wake up. Actually, Adrian and I were up at 8:00am, he went off for a long walk, while I jumped in the shower. At 9:30 he still was not back so I got Jessie up and we went down for breakfast. He joined us about 9:45am; once his breakfast was over we meandered over to the Hofburg. We had tickets for an 11:00a.m morning exercise display at the “Spanish Riding School”. This is where the Lipizzaner stallions are trained and shown. We had been told that it would only be a 1 hour exercise show of the young horses and mares, because the stallions are off in the summer pastures enjoying a holiday. However, we got lucky, they not only did some showing of antique imperial carriages and the horses that pull them, but brought in some of the 3 year old colts from the pastures (they start training the stallions at 3.5 years of age). And they brought in some of the mares and their new foals. It was a wonderful show and we learned lots of interesting things. One of which was that all of the Lipizzaner are dark until they are about 6 years old, that’s when they fade to their grey or white color.
Searching out some lunch at what appeared to be less of a tourist place and more of a local hangout. Lunch was fantastic I had amazing Goulash soooo yummy. We headed over to the Neu Burg (new palace) to see the arms and armor museum. Of course, they are closed on Tuesdays, so we headed over to the Natural History Museum; oh they’re closed for renovation. So, we found our way to the most amazing outdoor market. I truly wish we had something along those lines in Ireland where we are living. The fruits and veg were so incredible. We bought some raviolis and pesto to bring back to our apartment to cook for dinner with pesto. Mm its ok, the pesto is a little strong but the raviolis themselves were ok. Found some very delicious bread to go with it.
July 8, 2009
Today our last day in Vienna, Adrian arranged for us to go on a sightseeing tour of the “Vienna Woods”. There were three stops on the tour. The first stop was at Mayerling, currently a nunnery and small chapel, formerly a hunting lodge belonging to the Crown Prince Rudolph. He was Sissi and Franz Joseph’s only son and apparently committed “murder suicide, killing his 17 year old mistress and himself. He was 31 when he died. Although the story is interesting there isn’t really anything to see in this site, you get to see the original coffin his mistress was buried in and a room with some pictures and a copy of his suicide note. They rush you through the place in about 15 minutes, but I believe it is how the Carmelite’s there support themselves, because they have a tour running through every 15 minutes. From there we went to a Cistercian Monastery, still monks living and working there, 61 to be exact. That was beautiful and the tour was very informative. The Church of the monastery also holds the remains of the Babenberg rulers who came before the Hapsburgs. The final stop on the tour was the Hinterbruhl Bei Wien Seegrotte. So, Hinterbrhul Bei Wien means Hinterbrhul in Vienna and Seegrotte is an underground lake. The lake was created in an old Gypsum Mine. In 1912, one of the tunnels in the lowest level of the mine collapsed and 20,000,000 liters of water flooded the entire level, from then the mine was shut down. In 1932 it was reopened as a display mine for tourists. In 1944 a subterranean airplane factory was established in the mine and some 2000 workers, many from the concentration camps constructed the first jet fighters there. In 1945 the Germans demolished the mine and factory. And later was reclaimed by the Austrian Republic and finally reopened as a tourist attraction. Now in order to keep the mine open as a tourist attraction and the level of the lake steady water must be pumped out nightly. There are 7 natural springs bringing the water into the lake which has no natural outflow. Nothing lives in the water and it is amazingly clear. There is a dragon standing near the boat dock when you get there for your ride on the lake. It is leftover from the last production of the Musketeers’ movie with Keifer Sutherland.
We came out of the mine had a hot dog, which means two long frankfurters on a plate with spicy brown mustard. If you want a hot dog in a bun in Austria, you must order a frankfurter. It’s very interesting. Then the bus ride back into the city of Vienna. As we were back into the city by 3:00pm we felt we had time to go to the Arms and Armor Museum which had been closed the day before. It was amazing and overwhelming, I wondered at one point how much armor one man could have really needed as many of the suits belonged to Maximillian I. It was crazy, but a very cool display, housed in the same museum was a collection of ancient and semi modern musical instruments and a collection from the digs at Ephesus. When we left the museum, I realized that it was only 4:45 and we would be passing the Spanish Riding School. One of the things they had told us the day of our show was that they had set up a “meadow” in the courtyard of the stables and every afternoon at 5:00pm they led the mares and their foals into it so they could still feel they were out at Piber. So we stayed to watch the foals and their mares and got some great shots of them playing. For our last dinner in Vienna we went in search of…..Italian food. Yes, we feel compelled to find Italian food in every city we visit. It was good food not spectacular.
July 9, 2009
As our flight did not leave until 1:00pm we got up, had some breakfast, and took a final walk around the city. Stopped into the Swarovski store, they are headquartered in Vienna. Did you know that OPEC is also headquartered in Vienna? The weather had been lovely for this trip and we had a very good 6 days.
Things I loved about Vienna, Wiener schnitzel, Ice Cream, Coffee, Hot dogs, Goulash, the look and feel of the city and the weather. Things I did not love about Vienna, it’s very expensive even by EU standards, and some of the people were rude not a lot though. And airport security was crazy, we went through 3 different check points Boarding card and ID were checked at the first 2, with your picture being taken at the 2nd location. Then you went through x-ray portion right at your gate, which did not seem so bad, until they changed the gate and you had to do so all over again. That was crazy. However, I think it was by far the easiest airport to go through security.
When we got to Gatwick, they seemed to have some new security procedures in place; they also took our picture when they checked our boarding pass and passport. When we got to the next step where you take your computer out etc., walk through the machine, it beeped for virtually every person who walked through, so you got a pat down. Then separately we took your shoes off and walked through again at a second location, all they were scanning at this location was the shoes. When we got to our gate, we went through a further checkpoint and that actually brought up the picture that had been taken at the first check point. Then we stepped over to yet another attendant who took our pass and checked our passport one more time. As we boarded the plane the attendant there had to sign our remaining half of the boarding pass. It was very crazy and we looked to see if anything had happened since we had left the week before, as we did not go through all of this last Thursday, but nothing. It was the most screening we had ever been through.
So, that’s it for now the Scaletti’s arrive tomorrow and my niece and sister Next week.
Enjoy the pictures.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/3713030420/
Saturday, June 27, 2009
June was a busy month
KC, Kerry and Jessie arrived home at the end of May. We took KC and Kerry up to Dublin overnight, before Jessie arrived. Then we took all three girls to Bunratty for a Medieval Dinner. The girls went off to London for three days on their own and I headed off to LA for a week of work. Funny thing it was very foggy in LA and the weather was in the Mid 60's, very strange weather. But, it was a good week and I got to see some old freinds which was lovely. When I got back Beth, Jim and Kiera were here. So off we trooped again to Dublin and had a great time. Beth, Jim and Kiera went off to London for 3 days. They came back, we hung out with them and their Cousins, so new Irish friends for us, Samir, Babe and Mags. Sunday night we went to a Ceili at the Bunratty which Jim said he really liked, this was the response we were hoping for. Put the three of them on the plane home on Monday morning and have just been having a quiet week now. Jessie started riding again at the Clare Equestrian Center yesterday, she said she is tired and her legs are sore today. We are off to Vienna next week and there will be some better blogging news.
Enjoy the measly photos.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/upload/done/
Enjoy the measly photos.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/upload/done/
Friday, May 22, 2009
Off and Running
On Tuesday we drove up to Dublin and spent the night. We dropped Oretta at the airport at 8 and said goodbye to her as the OCS folks to her to the gate. It was a good visit on both sides. That done, instead of just driving 3.5 hours back we thought we would make a bit of detour and see some of the surrounding coast. First stop Malahide Village-Starbucks. This is a very cute and active village. near as I can tell all of the Starbucks in the ROI are in and around Dublin Town. After our coffee and croissants we drove over to Malahide Castle and Demesne. You can tour the inside of the castle provided you arrive when its open (10:30am) instead of a very early (by Irish Standards) 9:30am. I was still able to get some lovely shots of the parklands and the buildings. A little background on the Castle, Malahide Castle, set on 250 acres of park land in the pretty seaside town of Malahide, was both a fortress and a private home for nearly eight hundred years. The Talbot family lived here from 1185 to 1973, when the last Lord Talbot died.
The house is furnished with beautiful period furniture together with an extensive collection of Irish portrait paintings, mainly from the National Gallery. The history of the Talbot family is recorded in the Great Hall, with portraits of generations of the family telling their own story of Ireland's stormy history. One of the more poignant legends concerns the morning of the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, when fourteen members of the family breakfasted together in this room, never to return, as all were dead by nightfall. Malahide Castle is very unique in Ireland because the Talbot family managed to keep control of the castle for 791 years. The Talbot family began their reign in 1185 and ended in 1976 despite a short interlude, 1649 to 1660, while Cromwell marched through Ireland. The lands and harbor of Malahide were granted to Richard Talbot in 1185, one of the knights who arrived in Ireland with Henry II in 1174. According to Burke's Peerage, Richard Talbot or de Talbot was the common ancestor of the Lords of Malahide and of the Earls of Shrewsbury.
The history of the Talbot family is recorded in the Great Hall,where portraits of generations of the family tell their own story of Ireland's stormy history. Many additions and alterations have been made to this romantic and beautiful structure, but the contours of the surrounding parklands have changed little in 800 years,retaining a sense of the past. Malahide Castle is operated by Dublin Tourism Attractions in conjunction with Fingal County Council. The hall of the castle is one of the purest specimens of Norman architecture but it is not known whether it dates from the reign of Henry IV or from that of Edward IV when the original building was considerably enlarged and embellished. The circular towers flanking the facade were added in 1765.
At the heart of the medieval castle is the Oak Room, approached by a winding stone staircase and lit by Gothic windows added in 1820 when the room was enlarged and the front hall below was created. The room is lined with carved oak from floor to ceiling, representing scriptural subjects, now black with age and polishing. Some of the carving is of Flemish origin, including six panels representing biblical scenes opposite the window; their religious theme suggests that the Talbots, who remained Roman Catholics until 1774, used this room as a chapel in penal times. Over the mantelpiece is a fine representation of the coronation of the Blessed Virgin which according to tradition disappeared when Cromwell seized the Castle and miraculously sprang back to it's place when the Talbots were reinstated.
From there we headed over to Howth - just because Adrian had heard of the village and wanted to check it out. It was lovely, but there is no claim to fame other than Dubliners go there on a sunny day. It has a lighthouse and a working pier, not much else. We had a great walk along the harbor and feeling refreshed headed for home.
Enjoy the shots.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/?saved=1
The house is furnished with beautiful period furniture together with an extensive collection of Irish portrait paintings, mainly from the National Gallery. The history of the Talbot family is recorded in the Great Hall, with portraits of generations of the family telling their own story of Ireland's stormy history. One of the more poignant legends concerns the morning of the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, when fourteen members of the family breakfasted together in this room, never to return, as all were dead by nightfall. Malahide Castle is very unique in Ireland because the Talbot family managed to keep control of the castle for 791 years. The Talbot family began their reign in 1185 and ended in 1976 despite a short interlude, 1649 to 1660, while Cromwell marched through Ireland. The lands and harbor of Malahide were granted to Richard Talbot in 1185, one of the knights who arrived in Ireland with Henry II in 1174. According to Burke's Peerage, Richard Talbot or de Talbot was the common ancestor of the Lords of Malahide and of the Earls of Shrewsbury.
The history of the Talbot family is recorded in the Great Hall,where portraits of generations of the family tell their own story of Ireland's stormy history. Many additions and alterations have been made to this romantic and beautiful structure, but the contours of the surrounding parklands have changed little in 800 years,retaining a sense of the past. Malahide Castle is operated by Dublin Tourism Attractions in conjunction with Fingal County Council. The hall of the castle is one of the purest specimens of Norman architecture but it is not known whether it dates from the reign of Henry IV or from that of Edward IV when the original building was considerably enlarged and embellished. The circular towers flanking the facade were added in 1765.
At the heart of the medieval castle is the Oak Room, approached by a winding stone staircase and lit by Gothic windows added in 1820 when the room was enlarged and the front hall below was created. The room is lined with carved oak from floor to ceiling, representing scriptural subjects, now black with age and polishing. Some of the carving is of Flemish origin, including six panels representing biblical scenes opposite the window; their religious theme suggests that the Talbots, who remained Roman Catholics until 1774, used this room as a chapel in penal times. Over the mantelpiece is a fine representation of the coronation of the Blessed Virgin which according to tradition disappeared when Cromwell seized the Castle and miraculously sprang back to it's place when the Talbots were reinstated.
From there we headed over to Howth - just because Adrian had heard of the village and wanted to check it out. It was lovely, but there is no claim to fame other than Dubliners go there on a sunny day. It has a lighthouse and a working pier, not much else. We had a great walk along the harbor and feeling refreshed headed for home.
Enjoy the shots.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/?saved=1
Friday, May 15, 2009
Gotta Love Ryanair
So, while Oretta was here we thought we would take a quick trip over to Italy so she could visit family in Vico. We booked our flight on Ryanair out of Dublin to Pisa, only direct route and it was very cheap - 125 euro for all three of us. Can't beat those prices. So the flight is leaving from Dublin at 8:40pm and arriving in Pisa at 11:50pm. We arranged a hotel to spend the night in Pisa, the plan was to pick up the rental car and drive to Vico the next day. We left Shannon about 1:00pm in the afternoon. Got to the airport in Dublin with plenty of time to spare, got through security and picked up som sandwiches to eat. Plane takes off fine, smooth easy flight. Ladies and Gentlemen this is your captain we are now circling Pisa because there is fog. 10 minutes later captain comes on again, we are going to divert to Genoa because we do not have good enough visibility to land in Pisa. Arrive in Genoa it's now maybe 12:30am - land, sit on the plane for a few minutes. Captain comes on we are going to put you all on a bus and drive you to Pisa. Sit waiting for buses to arrive. Oh, it looks like the weather has improved so we will refuel and fly to Pisa, sit back and relax. Few minutes (maybe 30) later, we are going to offload you while we refuel so you can wait in comfort while we refuel. Of course, Adrian being fluent in Italian and fortunately (thank you Oretta) us being at the front of the plane - he hears them dickering about who exactly is going to pay for the fuel, because it was not pre-arranged in Genoa. They take us off the plane and into the terminal- the airport is of course closed. We hear an announcement your flight for Pisa should depart at approximately 1:40am. Ok, 30 minutes later - announcement. Pisa airport is closed, please proceed to baggage claim, collect your bags, go through Passport Control, we are going to bus you to Pisa. So bus finally arrives, we all climb on board and hmm, its a 2.5 hour bus ride to Pisa its now about 3-3:30am. We arrive in the coach park of Pisa airport at 5:00am. Get a taxi to the hotel, because of course nothing is open yet. Check-in, sleep for a couple of hours, Adrian gets the car and off we go to Vico. It was a very long night but hey we were in Italy so all is good. We got to meet cousins Adrian has never met during the week we were there and visit other friends and cousins in the village.
Even with the drama of getting to Vico it was a wonderful week and we were very sad to come home last night. It would have been nice to have stayed longer, but we took a few photos, ate way to much, enjoyed the sun, I figure my tan will be gone in 2-3 days and enjoyed the company.
Hope you all like the pictures and accompanying explanations!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
Even with the drama of getting to Vico it was a wonderful week and we were very sad to come home last night. It would have been nice to have stayed longer, but we took a few photos, ate way to much, enjoyed the sun, I figure my tan will be gone in 2-3 days and enjoyed the company.
Hope you all like the pictures and accompanying explanations!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Spring in Ireland
Since the beginning of April, Oretta has arrived for four weeks. We have colored eggs, had a group over for Easter dinner. Unfortunately I forgot to take any pictures on Easter Sunday. Gone hiking (just Adrian and I) at a Hill Fort and gone to Kinsale for 3 days.
Oretta arrived having broken a rib maybe two not sure there. She tripped over her luggage the day of her departure and thought she had only bruised it, but she has been in constant severe pain, so dr's. Adrian and Tanya have decided she broke something. That has been unfortunate because she is really not up to doing much and spends most of her time laying down trying to feel better. If you are ever in Ireland and need Tylenol with Codeine, ask for Panadeine.
Two days after Oretta's arrival we had freinds bring their kids over so we could color easter eggs. This is something not done here in Ireland and thanks to Oretta bringing the PAAS to me we were able to teach something new to some of our Irish neighbors. The eggs here are all brown, they don't have leghorns or any of the white egg laying chickens we do in the states - funny that brown is considered organic and so we pay more in the us. It's just a marketing ploy you know, the color of the egg is determined by the kind of chicken. Anyway, I was a little worried about whether or not the dye would take, not only did it, but the colors were very vibrant. The kids had a lot of fun and I got to really enjoy myself. Definately miss having little ones around for that kind of thing.
Easter Sunday, Adrian and I were up at 4:30am to go to a Sunrise mass at the cemetry near us. The mass was different and beautiful. Not only do we get blessed with holy water, but the preist goes around and blesses the graves (it's not a huge cemetry), that took about 20 minutes of the mass. He also blessed the Easter Fire which they still light here. So it was all very nice. Then at 3:00pm we had most of Adrian's co-workers and some neighbors over for dinner. Stuffed leg of lamb, I think I did a fab job on it.
Since then, Adrian and I took a hike at the Mooghaun Hill Fort, just a couple of miles from our house. It's a wonderful Neolithic site that used to be part of the Dromoland Estate. The OPW maintains the site today, which is located in the middle of a forrest. Further on the same track is an old Tower Castle, according to Adrian was purchased by an american and he stays there when he is here. He wasn't home the day we went walking but there are some lovely shots of the tower.
Friday night we went to see the High Kings play in Ennis, they are an Irish folk band and quite good, one of the members is a Clancy child so of course you know we got to hear some of their music as well. http://www.thehighkings.com/
Saturday morning we were up and off on our way to Kinsale. Kinsale is one of the oldest towns in Ireland, was a bustling seaport. It hosts a natural harbor and has been inhabited since the Bronze Age, possibly longer. There are bronze age copper mines nearby. The Spanish Armada sailed into Kinsale in 1601 to help the Ulster cheiftans and their clans with a rebellion against Elizabeth I. Unfortunately, the Spanish troops (5,000 in number) were pinned down in Kinsale by the English commander who was the first to fight in the winter months. This gave him a huge advantage because that had never been done before. The Irish attacked on Christmas Eve 1601, they were beaten by the English. This created what was known as "The flight of the earls". Peace was agreed between Spain and England and the English began sending the Scottish over to settle vasts areas. Just off the Old Kinsale Head is where the Lusitania was sunk by the Germans during World War I and their is a small memorial to them. Kinsale town is a bit reminiscent of Sausalito but older and in many ways cuter. It still holds Desmond Castle, home to the Fitzpatrick's who were the Earls of Desmond. During the American revolution French and American sailors were held there as prisoners. Following that, during the great famine it was an auxiliary workhouse for the poor. And today is an International Wine Museum. Turns out there were/are a significant number of Irish families that went over to France and became vintners.
From Kinsale we toured around the region, we went to Clonakilty, birthplace of Michael Collins., Timoleague Abbey, Gandolore for lunch pretty harbor, Old Head and Mizen Head, with many stops in between for photos.
Hope you enjoy the pictures. http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
Oretta arrived having broken a rib maybe two not sure there. She tripped over her luggage the day of her departure and thought she had only bruised it, but she has been in constant severe pain, so dr's. Adrian and Tanya have decided she broke something. That has been unfortunate because she is really not up to doing much and spends most of her time laying down trying to feel better. If you are ever in Ireland and need Tylenol with Codeine, ask for Panadeine.
Two days after Oretta's arrival we had freinds bring their kids over so we could color easter eggs. This is something not done here in Ireland and thanks to Oretta bringing the PAAS to me we were able to teach something new to some of our Irish neighbors. The eggs here are all brown, they don't have leghorns or any of the white egg laying chickens we do in the states - funny that brown is considered organic and so we pay more in the us. It's just a marketing ploy you know, the color of the egg is determined by the kind of chicken. Anyway, I was a little worried about whether or not the dye would take, not only did it, but the colors were very vibrant. The kids had a lot of fun and I got to really enjoy myself. Definately miss having little ones around for that kind of thing.
Easter Sunday, Adrian and I were up at 4:30am to go to a Sunrise mass at the cemetry near us. The mass was different and beautiful. Not only do we get blessed with holy water, but the preist goes around and blesses the graves (it's not a huge cemetry), that took about 20 minutes of the mass. He also blessed the Easter Fire which they still light here. So it was all very nice. Then at 3:00pm we had most of Adrian's co-workers and some neighbors over for dinner. Stuffed leg of lamb, I think I did a fab job on it.
Since then, Adrian and I took a hike at the Mooghaun Hill Fort, just a couple of miles from our house. It's a wonderful Neolithic site that used to be part of the Dromoland Estate. The OPW maintains the site today, which is located in the middle of a forrest. Further on the same track is an old Tower Castle, according to Adrian was purchased by an american and he stays there when he is here. He wasn't home the day we went walking but there are some lovely shots of the tower.
Friday night we went to see the High Kings play in Ennis, they are an Irish folk band and quite good, one of the members is a Clancy child so of course you know we got to hear some of their music as well. http://www.thehighkings.com/
Saturday morning we were up and off on our way to Kinsale. Kinsale is one of the oldest towns in Ireland, was a bustling seaport. It hosts a natural harbor and has been inhabited since the Bronze Age, possibly longer. There are bronze age copper mines nearby. The Spanish Armada sailed into Kinsale in 1601 to help the Ulster cheiftans and their clans with a rebellion against Elizabeth I. Unfortunately, the Spanish troops (5,000 in number) were pinned down in Kinsale by the English commander who was the first to fight in the winter months. This gave him a huge advantage because that had never been done before. The Irish attacked on Christmas Eve 1601, they were beaten by the English. This created what was known as "The flight of the earls". Peace was agreed between Spain and England and the English began sending the Scottish over to settle vasts areas. Just off the Old Kinsale Head is where the Lusitania was sunk by the Germans during World War I and their is a small memorial to them. Kinsale town is a bit reminiscent of Sausalito but older and in many ways cuter. It still holds Desmond Castle, home to the Fitzpatrick's who were the Earls of Desmond. During the American revolution French and American sailors were held there as prisoners. Following that, during the great famine it was an auxiliary workhouse for the poor. And today is an International Wine Museum. Turns out there were/are a significant number of Irish families that went over to France and became vintners.
From Kinsale we toured around the region, we went to Clonakilty, birthplace of Michael Collins., Timoleague Abbey, Gandolore for lunch pretty harbor, Old Head and Mizen Head, with many stops in between for photos.
Hope you enjoy the pictures. http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
March Madness
March has been crazy busy, we have had visitors from home for 3 of the weeks of the month. Of course for us this is great. We have taken our visitors to Dublin and the Cliffs of Moher and the Burren and to the Dingle Peninsula. Robin and Jerry came for 10 days and it seemed to fly by. Then we had a three day break and Kathleen and Lynne jumped over for 5 days. It has been great fun to have them here and it continues. Lots of visitors are planning to come over this summer, which of course is great for me. Oretta arrives on the 6th of April and will stay until the 20th of May, then the O'Shea girls arrive at the end of May followed quickly by the rest of their family and then at the end of July my sister and niece. I am really looking forward to having the house full and busy, all though the O'Shea's have family in Kerry and will most likely spend the bulk of their visit there it should still be busy enough.
I have attached the photo link for flickr, I have not finished uploading photos but will get to it as quickly as I can.
Slan
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
I have attached the photo link for flickr, I have not finished uploading photos but will get to it as quickly as I can.
Slan
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Reindeer, Ferries and Northern Lights
Ok, so I have to catch up on the last few days.
2/14/09 - Valentines Day, a liesurely morning spent walking around Tromso. We stopped and had a very nice lunch at a local cafe. It was very busy with University Students. I thought I was being very brave and ordered Lasagna. It was actually quite good, so I have to say again, the Norwegians are superior cooks. Then we headed over to the ferry to take a 2.5 ride around the local waterways. On the way to the ferry we stopped and watched a group of young people promoting safe sex. I think you will find the pictures most amusing. Even though we don't speak the language the meaning was very clear. The ride around the local fjords was fabulous and you will see lots of great scenery pictures. Norway is the most magnificent place I have ever seen. The landscape in winter is not only stunning but fairytale like.
2/15/09 - Sunday, we wandered over to the "Polaria Museet" its an underwaters polor musuem that did not open until noon. It only took about 1 hour to go through the museum, including watching the feeding and training of the bearded seals they have there. They train them only to keep their minds active since they are captive. One of the interesting things we learned about them is that they are about 2 levels above dogs on the smart scale, so very easy to train, but also easily bored. When we finished our wander we went to Burger King for a late lunch and then back to our room for a nap. At 5:00pm we would meet a group for an evening of Sami Culture and Reindeer Sleigh Ride. A bit about the Sami. They are the only indigenous peoples in Europe. They speak a seperate language which is not of "indo-european" origin. They have a completely seperate culture and range across Norway, Finland, Sweden and Russia. They are the traditional reindeer hearders and one wonders if in some form the Sami weren't the basis for Santa's elves. The clothing and shoes certainly fit and of course they heard the reindeer and train some of them. They look the same as the rest of the scandanavian peoples.
So, we were expecting a traditional sleigh pulled by some reindeer. However, traditional Sami Sledges are just some slates of wood and the runners, you either sit up on them with your legs out straight or lay down on your back. We chose to lay down on our backs and watch the stars go buy. It was a very clear night and the temperature out in the wilderness was -15 celcius. Very, very cold. However, other people had chosen to do the dog sleds for this evening, when we heard the chaos involved in that we were quite glad we had chosen the reindeer ride. They had to drive their dog sleds themselves, a few over turned with some minor injuries. And they went very fast and did not get to stop for photos as we did. So I would say we had the better time. After the sleighing and riding we went to the "Lavuu" a traditional Sami tent for a traditional dinner. Dinner was fish soup and the bread the Sami make. I of course am not a huge fan of fish so was thinking darn. Guess what it was actually quite good. Very thick rather like a really good New England Clam Chowder with wild salmon instead of clams. We got back to the hotel at about 2 am without ever having seen the Northern Lights, which was why we chose the evening sleigh ride.
2/16/09 - Monday, our last day in Tromso, and boy am I tired. Adrian decided we should take a ferry to the town of Harstad and wander around there. It would be a 2.5 hour ferry ride to get there and then we could have lunch a short wander and then back on the boat for the ride back to Tromso. Harstad was quaint and there was the very unique built entirely into the mountain waterpark. Of course, as our luck would have it the waterpark was closed. We had great burgers at a local cafe, took a walk around the town and the waterfront and back onto the ferry. Adrian took some great sunset scenery shots and we got a pizza and packed to head back to Oslo.
2/17/09- 6am flight back to Oslo, checked into the hotel early and headed out for the Akershus Fortress and Castle, spent about 3 hours there checking out both the military history museum and the resistance museum. Then over to the Nobel Peace Center spent another couple of hours in there and had lunch in the cafe attached to the center. Walked over to City Hall a stunning building unfortunately no pictures allowed. Toured that and walked back to the hotel. Tomorrow we fly home.
We are working on our top 10 destinations list as we travel Europe, and Norway is currently in first place with nobody even coming close to how much I have fallen in love with this country!
http://flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
2/14/09 - Valentines Day, a liesurely morning spent walking around Tromso. We stopped and had a very nice lunch at a local cafe. It was very busy with University Students. I thought I was being very brave and ordered Lasagna. It was actually quite good, so I have to say again, the Norwegians are superior cooks. Then we headed over to the ferry to take a 2.5 ride around the local waterways. On the way to the ferry we stopped and watched a group of young people promoting safe sex. I think you will find the pictures most amusing. Even though we don't speak the language the meaning was very clear. The ride around the local fjords was fabulous and you will see lots of great scenery pictures. Norway is the most magnificent place I have ever seen. The landscape in winter is not only stunning but fairytale like.
2/15/09 - Sunday, we wandered over to the "Polaria Museet" its an underwaters polor musuem that did not open until noon. It only took about 1 hour to go through the museum, including watching the feeding and training of the bearded seals they have there. They train them only to keep their minds active since they are captive. One of the interesting things we learned about them is that they are about 2 levels above dogs on the smart scale, so very easy to train, but also easily bored. When we finished our wander we went to Burger King for a late lunch and then back to our room for a nap. At 5:00pm we would meet a group for an evening of Sami Culture and Reindeer Sleigh Ride. A bit about the Sami. They are the only indigenous peoples in Europe. They speak a seperate language which is not of "indo-european" origin. They have a completely seperate culture and range across Norway, Finland, Sweden and Russia. They are the traditional reindeer hearders and one wonders if in some form the Sami weren't the basis for Santa's elves. The clothing and shoes certainly fit and of course they heard the reindeer and train some of them. They look the same as the rest of the scandanavian peoples.
So, we were expecting a traditional sleigh pulled by some reindeer. However, traditional Sami Sledges are just some slates of wood and the runners, you either sit up on them with your legs out straight or lay down on your back. We chose to lay down on our backs and watch the stars go buy. It was a very clear night and the temperature out in the wilderness was -15 celcius. Very, very cold. However, other people had chosen to do the dog sleds for this evening, when we heard the chaos involved in that we were quite glad we had chosen the reindeer ride. They had to drive their dog sleds themselves, a few over turned with some minor injuries. And they went very fast and did not get to stop for photos as we did. So I would say we had the better time. After the sleighing and riding we went to the "Lavuu" a traditional Sami tent for a traditional dinner. Dinner was fish soup and the bread the Sami make. I of course am not a huge fan of fish so was thinking darn. Guess what it was actually quite good. Very thick rather like a really good New England Clam Chowder with wild salmon instead of clams. We got back to the hotel at about 2 am without ever having seen the Northern Lights, which was why we chose the evening sleigh ride.
2/16/09 - Monday, our last day in Tromso, and boy am I tired. Adrian decided we should take a ferry to the town of Harstad and wander around there. It would be a 2.5 hour ferry ride to get there and then we could have lunch a short wander and then back on the boat for the ride back to Tromso. Harstad was quaint and there was the very unique built entirely into the mountain waterpark. Of course, as our luck would have it the waterpark was closed. We had great burgers at a local cafe, took a walk around the town and the waterfront and back onto the ferry. Adrian took some great sunset scenery shots and we got a pizza and packed to head back to Oslo.
2/17/09- 6am flight back to Oslo, checked into the hotel early and headed out for the Akershus Fortress and Castle, spent about 3 hours there checking out both the military history museum and the resistance museum. Then over to the Nobel Peace Center spent another couple of hours in there and had lunch in the cafe attached to the center. Walked over to City Hall a stunning building unfortunately no pictures allowed. Toured that and walked back to the hotel. Tomorrow we fly home.
We are working on our top 10 destinations list as we travel Europe, and Norway is currently in first place with nobody even coming close to how much I have fallen in love with this country!
http://flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/
Friday, February 13, 2009
Tromso
We arrived in Tromso today it is absolutely beautiful here. Before I go further though, I need to mention that the food in Norway is unbelievably good. So far we have had a tomato/paprika soup that was amazing, venison that was not as gamey as the venison at home and tonight we both had wonderful baked halibut. I would say that the Norwegian cooks are second only to the Italians, maybe even equal as the style of cooking is different. Very impressed with the food. Ok, so Tromso, we will be here for 3 days, today our arrival day was an easy going day. Taking naps, walking around the town looking at the beautiful views. Our room looks right out onto the Fjord. Tomorrow we will take a boat cruise and visit some of the local museums. We are hoping that we get to see the Northern lights while we are here, but have been hearing that its been a terrible year for it. We should come back in two years because the sun will be in a stronger position and then we will have a better opportunity to see fantastic displays. Good to know. We are about 2,000 km from the Arctic Circle and Roald Amundssen took off for his final expedition from here. We are actually farther north than we would be were we in Alaska.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Land of the Midnight Sun
Yesterday was a long travel day for us. We left Shannon at approximately 4:20 p.m. for a quick flight to London Stanstead Airport, where we would have just about 1 and 1/2 hours to transfer for a flight to Oslo. So, Ryanair out of Stanstead is a mess, you get your boarding pass at an auto/self serve terminal, which in and of itself is no issue. Then you que in a very unrully long que to drop your bags if you have checked them - we did. Finally, Adrian left the line and found some one to check our bags because we now had 10 minutes until our flight boarded and oh its a 15 minute walk to our gate. We get their in the nick of time and board. Haven't eaten since early in the day. We arrived at Oslo Thorpe (or something along those lines) airport at 10:20pm. We grabbed a hotdog - which was tasty and caught the bus to Oslo and hour and 45 minutes ride. We got lost once in the city trying to find the hotel and finally caught a cab. We checked in at around 1:00am and oh they are "so sorry but there was a mix up with our room." When you see the pictures you will realize it wasn't such a bad mix up because they ended up upgrading us to a suite. A very fun nautically themed suite called the Sundt Suite. We got up this morning around 9:30am and had a relaxing breakfast, before heading off for the waterfront. We were meant to catch a ferry over to the island where the folk museum and viking museum were. But the boat could not get over there to much ice. Alas, no boat tour of the Fjord on our way to the museums. We walked over to the center and caught a bus that would take us out there. We spent the day checking out what medeival homes and villages looked like in different regions of Norway and then went to the Viking Ship Museum. Both locations were great fun. Its incredibly cold but beautiful here and after we were done we caught the bus back so that I could have a nice nap and thaw. We are off to dinner now and a walk to the original fortress and castle for a view of it at night. Tomorrow will be an early flight up to Tromso where we will spend the rest of our time here. Loretta and Peter we think you would have loved this trip.
Enjoy the pictures.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/?saved=1
Enjoy the pictures.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/?saved=1
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
The Weather Continued
Ok, so I have gone back and forth two day - am I subscriber of the glass half empty or half full theory.
I was meant to go to an auction today and pick up a wardrobe and a small table that we had previewed. So, being that we have only one car I got up early (6:30am) and drove Adrian to work. As I am coming down the hill to come home on one of our main roads. Hit a patch of ice and slid completely out of controll. Took out a wooden rail on the side of the road. Ripped the front bumper, the back bumper, punched a hole in the oil pan and messed up one of the rear axles. Thats before the mechanic has really looked at the car. Called the Garda, called Adrian, Garda came, took my information, called a tow for me, said sit in your car they should be here in about 15 minutes. This was at half seven (as they say here) 7:30am. At 9:30am the farmer across the street said this is crazy, you'll come up to the house, have a cup of tea and get warm. I'll call my son to take you home. When the tow truck finally showed up at about noon, I had left the doors unlocked and my tom tom was stolen out of the glove box.
The glass half full portion of this scenario is: I was not hurt in the slightest, the farmer Pat and his wife Kathleen were amazingly nice people and we had a lovely visit. The reason the tow never showed up. Around the next round about on the next road there was an 8 car pile up, including a fire brigade truck that all had also spun out on ice. The tow truck had to go handle that call first - yes there are very few tow trucks in the area. They had to cut a man out of his overturned van.
So, now I am without a vehicle, but I am off to Norway for a week, so it will keep, I was not injured, I met some new people who were very nice and I did not spend any money at the auction. At first I was very frustrated and disappointed with everything that happened. But then I thought about the fact that I did not suffer really and I do have insurance. Initially all I could think about was freaking Genghis was back (some of you know what I am talking about!) but then I decided I would work with the glass half full theory.
I am working on trying to down load the pictures from my cell phone - but have not been successful as of yet. Adrian pointed out that I have now wiped out two cars and I really should stop doing that. Whatever......
Remember life could always be a lot worse and difficult situations are an opportunity.
I was meant to go to an auction today and pick up a wardrobe and a small table that we had previewed. So, being that we have only one car I got up early (6:30am) and drove Adrian to work. As I am coming down the hill to come home on one of our main roads. Hit a patch of ice and slid completely out of controll. Took out a wooden rail on the side of the road. Ripped the front bumper, the back bumper, punched a hole in the oil pan and messed up one of the rear axles. Thats before the mechanic has really looked at the car. Called the Garda, called Adrian, Garda came, took my information, called a tow for me, said sit in your car they should be here in about 15 minutes. This was at half seven (as they say here) 7:30am. At 9:30am the farmer across the street said this is crazy, you'll come up to the house, have a cup of tea and get warm. I'll call my son to take you home. When the tow truck finally showed up at about noon, I had left the doors unlocked and my tom tom was stolen out of the glove box.
The glass half full portion of this scenario is: I was not hurt in the slightest, the farmer Pat and his wife Kathleen were amazingly nice people and we had a lovely visit. The reason the tow never showed up. Around the next round about on the next road there was an 8 car pile up, including a fire brigade truck that all had also spun out on ice. The tow truck had to go handle that call first - yes there are very few tow trucks in the area. They had to cut a man out of his overturned van.
So, now I am without a vehicle, but I am off to Norway for a week, so it will keep, I was not injured, I met some new people who were very nice and I did not spend any money at the auction. At first I was very frustrated and disappointed with everything that happened. But then I thought about the fact that I did not suffer really and I do have insurance. Initially all I could think about was freaking Genghis was back (some of you know what I am talking about!) but then I decided I would work with the glass half full theory.
I am working on trying to down load the pictures from my cell phone - but have not been successful as of yet. Adrian pointed out that I have now wiped out two cars and I really should stop doing that. Whatever......
Remember life could always be a lot worse and difficult situations are an opportunity.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Crazy Weather
The weather has been insane for the last week. On Saturday last (17 Jan) we had tremendous thunderstorms that included lightening hitting our phone line and knocking it out. We were having a welcome to Ireland party. The party is set to start at 6pm. Paula and the boys came over early to help and we were just sitting on the sofa chatting around 4pm when all of a sudden we hear this tremendous crack like a large firecracker right in your ear. Huge flash of light and oh no power. So we called in to ESB and let them know. Figured its a good thing I love candles and figured we could barbecue the meat if we had to. However about an hour later the lights came back on- big relief. Later we discovered that the phone jack had been blown out of the wall by the lightening and we had no phone. The phone company finally arrived yesterday and fixed the phone line. However, the lightening burnt out our vonage modem so it will be a while before we have a phone for the Americans again. I will let everybody know when its back up and running. The rain storms continued for 3 days, and by Monday we were having snow flurries, with great big snow flakes. Unfortunately, it was not cold enough for the snow to stick to the ground. It was fun to sit in the house and watch the snow fall. Today, Thursday it is beautifully clear and sunny - cold though.
I am leaving for Vegas for a week tomorrow and will be back in Ireland on the 31st.
Keep well, Keep Safe and Keep in touch
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/?saved=1
I am leaving for Vegas for a week tomorrow and will be back in Ireland on the 31st.
Keep well, Keep Safe and Keep in touch
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/?saved=1
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Just another day in Newmarket
Christmas is well and truly over as you can see by our poor dissasembled tree. Don't ever let Adrian Scaletti near a plant of yours with a hand saw! It can be quite frightening. All of the middle got burnt up in the fireplace, he liked the swishing and crackling noise the branches made. Then dragged this poor remnant of a tree into the shed. We will cut it up and burn the rest in the fireplace.
Today we went to check out the market in Ennistymon, it was not a very good market unfortunately and so we took a walk around the village and along the river. After about 3 weeks of no rain we have had 4 or 5 days of downpours and this is what the river looked like after the rains. It was actually quite spectacular.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Advent 2008
We have had a lovely and busy holiday season. It started with Adrian and I going off to Bristol, England for the Christmas Market, we weren't to thrilled with the market itself but, thoroughly enjoyed Bristol and some of the surrounding area. Then the kids arrived on the 20th and Jessie and I went to Tea with friends on the 22nd. Followed closely by a lovely open house Christmas Eve with friends, neighbors and coworkers of Adrian's. Our friends the Kozlowski's spent the night and we all enjoyed a relaxing Christmas morning. We the Scaletti's just hung out Christmas day and did not do much of anything. Adrian and Michael went off to do some exploring on Boxing Day/St. Stephen's day aka the day after Christmas. Jessie and I stayed behind because we had both caught cold. Then we went up to Dublin to celebrate New Year's eve, it was great fun and we inadvertently picked a hotel that had a wonderful New Year's tradition associated with it. The Cathedral across the street is called Christ Church and has an amazing number of bells. It is the largest peal of bells in the world and is rung on New year's Eve, large crowds (and they were large) assemble outside to hear the bells and celebrate the New Year. Will be going back and staying in the same place next year. We had a leisurely drive back to Newmarket on the Friday following New Years and the kids leave to go home Monday, the 5th, which is an appropriate but sad way to end the season.
It has been a wonderful experience for our first Christmas in Europe and unbelievably we will have already been here a year in March! Time is already flying by so don't forget to come for a visit....
Hope you enjoy the photos.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/sets/72157612039934887/
It has been a wonderful experience for our first Christmas in Europe and unbelievably we will have already been here a year in March! Time is already flying by so don't forget to come for a visit....
Hope you enjoy the photos.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/sets/72157612039934887/
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