Bye-bye

We're home!

We are back and happy to be home - as amazing and wonderful and relaxing as our awesome trip was I can honestly say it's good to be home! I love Lincoln - especially in the Spring, I love my home - bed - shower - car - and I've miss my friends and family :-)

More Moloneys-McNameras

We're on our way home

We've been to Cobh and had lots of surprises - The Independence of the Sea on her maiden voyage docked while we had lunch. The town was alive greeting them with trditional music and food and gift stands. 6,000 people on the ship - passengers and crew! We went to Mass at the Cathedral - amazingly beautiful old church, and stayed at a B&B that is in a house built in 1840 -12' ceilings and a character of a hostess, Pam. The museum - Queenstown Story - in the old train station -vwas well done and informative - imigation, prison ships, Titanic and Lusitania.

On Sunday we moved on to the Shannon airport area in anticipation of todays flight home (when we arrive we will have been up for 24 hours). We did some shopping and repacking and then went to Kemp's second cousin Eithne (Moloney) McNamara's home for dinner. We met her husband Michael, who will get us through security at Shannon airport today - as he is head of airport security, and daughter Marina (17) and son Donica (15). Really a nice family. We also met cousin Maureen Maloney and her boyfriend of 30 years, Ciaran Butler from Dublin (they were here for the bank holiday).

We've been to Cobh

May Is Here In County Kerry

May Is Here!

Spring has definitely arrived. In Dingle Town for two days. Brilliant weather. Great little fishing village with a quaint downtown. Currently embroiled in a controversy over changing the name of the town. We stayed about a mile west of the village on Dingle Bay. Drove around Slea Head yesterday. On to Cork today. We will visit the Cobh Museum. Cobh, nee Queensland when the Brits were in charge, was the port where all the emigrants departed via steerage on their way to America, Australia, Canada. Also the last port of call for the Titanic!

May Day in Dingle Town

Pat & Peg on the beach at Fenore

For Larry

Pics from yesterday - Sunday Ap 27th

We visited Kemp's second cousins yesterday. Kathleen, Ethna and Tim and his wife Anne on their farm. Tim is a farmer - primary school teacher and artist. They just built a shop on the farm - Anne sells the prints and produces the prints and ships out of the shop which is also a Gallery of Tim's work. Tim's working studio is on the farm too. We had a tire blow out yesterday on the rental car - less than a mile from "home" so we walked the rest of the way and Jim and Kemp are dealing with getting a new tire right now :-)

Kemp and his second cousins

pics

Cliffs of Moher - St Bridget's Holy Well and some Leydens!

Hello again - anyone out there???

We're having fun

The pictures are of our trip to Dublin and "Our" house in Fenore and views from the house.
Battery running low now that I have a wireless connection - I'll get this right by the time we leave Ireland I'm sure. just want you to see that we are enjoying ourselves and making plans to return already. We have visited so many fun places including St Bridget's Well - where we prayered for everyone. We've been to Dulin the last two nights for traditional Irish music in the pubs. In Dublin we visited Trinity College and saw the book of Kells, also visited the Writers Museum and James Joyce Museum. We have had fabulouse food here too - we have eaten our way thorough Ireland. The people are friendly - fun and sarcastic. The time is slow and the views spectacular. On Sunday we will go to the Maloneys for dinner and to meet more family.
We hve shopped alot and are drowning our selves in Irish music both in the house and in the car.

Back with pictures

In Fenore

We are at the house in Fenore now - I can't get over it - it is like living in a work of art. My heart is singing. Wireless connection is week - so I'm at an Internet sight in another town - paying by the minuet - hope to get a good signal tomorrow so I can do a long post and put up some pictures.
Love to all, from all of us.

Hostess

Ethna Diver, our gracious hostess at Inishduff House in Kilcar. Ethna was great. Our next visit to Kilcar will be at Ethna's B & B. Lavish accomodations, out of this world breakfasts and great conversations, along with a lot of help. Thank Ethna!

Into The Connemara

We went to Mass in Carrick Sunday morning and met up with Bridget and Harry Holden, more of the Curran Clan from Teelin. After Mass we went to their house for tea and discussed a variety of things including family, the church, politics, St. Bridget-Abbess and Bishop ( yep, a girl Bishop. Quick tell the Catholic Heirarchy), the IRA, the state of affairs in Northern Ireland, and got some ideas from them about our adventure to Dublin in a couple of days.

Departed beautiful County Donegal and drove to Clifden (An Clochan) in the Connemara. Generally the roads have improved since our last visit but the stretch from Westport to Clifden was the centuries old, narrow, curvy, roller coaster ride that was a real white knuckle experience. Needless to say Jim was driving.

Sea Bass and Lemon Sole for dinner. Window shopping. Fun.

TIME OF SOME PICS

Greetings From Cill Cartha (Kilcar)

Day in Kilcar, Killybegs, Donegal Town. Wonderful dinner with Jim's cousin Gene Curran and wife Maia at the Blue Haven. Then to the Town Hall at Cill Cartha for Irish fiddlers, singers, dancers. Almost three hours of authentic Irish Folk entertainment by locals. Would have had to pay $100 for this if it was at the Lied Center.

We're Here!

We are having such a good time - just finished our first full day in Ireland - the picture is from our room in the B&B in Kilcar. We have been to Galway and Knock - Sligo and Kilcar. We have eaten too much - laughed often - shopped some - driven some and met some really nice people. We plan on doing this over and over again for the next 17 days! This morning we had breakfast with people from the Quad Cities - small world. We visited Yeats' grave and the shrine at Knock. Tomorrow we are having dinner with Jim's cousin and his wife and then going to a music fest at the parish hall. Kemp's phone is working and we have had wireless Internet in both of the B&Bs we have stayed in. The roads in Ireland have improved and the food has been amazing. The picture downloads, for the blog, have been slow and then canceled - will try again, tomorrow night, to send something more interesting. If you have troble responding to the blog - just email :-)

Isn't it beautiful ?

The title of this photo is "Idle Hours" that's what I'm looking for in Ireland - plenty of idle hours :-)

We're still here...

We're still here - just preparing to leave - a must do before departure was starting a blog :-)

TRIP TO IRELAND

Hi everyone,
Here's a blog for our trip. Dad and I will be leaving from Omaha on Wed April 16th(Rob's 30th birthday) in the afternoon and flying to Shannon airport in Ireland, via Chicago. When we can get a connection we will blog and try to keep you up to date on our travels. Mom