A Castle and a Spectacular Grave

Now I dont want to scare my family out there, but driving in Ireland, particularly in Dublin, is a little like taking your life in your hands. Of course they drive on the left, which is extremely confusing to us who drive the "right" way (imagine turning right and going way across the road), and the roads tend to be very narrow. In an old city like Dublin, where roads just simply sprawled out as the city grew, and some roads change name several times in a mile, it is hard to describe how difficult it can be to navigate! Oh and there are no typical road signs like in the U.S.-the street names are on tiny signs on the sides of buildings at intersections! But we really wanted a car to be able to explore the gorgeous countryside when Ruben was off, so we got a GPS and thought we would be good. Until we realized the GPS was crazy! After taking us down alleyways, into parking garages and down a pedestrian ONLY street (Busy shopping street Grafton-I was trying to blend in with the car seats for those humiliating minutes), we exchanged our GPS for a more up to date model and headed out into the countryside for a much easier driving experience. We first came to a few seaside towns north of Dublin. They were quaint and comfy, although probably chilly in the winter with cool ocean breezes. We visited Trim Castle, the largest Norman castle in Ireland. Much of the movie Bravehart was filmed there-they used the outside as one castle and the inside as another. Lastly we saw the Newgrange passage tomb at Bru na Boinne. An ancient culture built it and others like it about 5,000 years ago. The tombs are older than the pyramids at Giza! Nothing is known about the builders except that they must have been intelligent, resourceful and hard-working to build these structures. They used huge stones they quarried from miles away (using the log rolling system) and the project took 2-3 generations. And they didn't have metal tools yet! They would place the cremated remains of people in a special inner chamber, supposedly to help them get to an afterlife. It was kinda late when we got back to town so a quick dinner at the London-fav noodle restaurant Wagamama capped off our night. Ruben has work tomorrow...

Ireland 2015

Ruben was asked to go to Ireland this week (kind of suddenly) and I was able to tag along! My dad arranged to fly out and watch the kids while we were gone...he's absolutely winning dad AND grandpa of the year!!! We flew over Saturday and, despite dealing with some serious jet lag, had a great first day yesterday! First we checked into our amazing hotel near St. Stephens Green, seriously the breakfast buffet is so enormous, elegant and delicious I may have to embarrass myself and snap a pic this week. Then we toured Trinity College and saw the Book of Kells and the Old Library. The Book of Kells is a copy of the 4 Gospels of the Bible painstakingly copied onto vellum 1200 years ago. But they also decorated it with exquisitely detailed illustrations of the text and unique page frame designs. It's the brightest spot in literature and arts in the Middle Ages!

The Old Library at Trinity is 2 stories high and very long and just one room. It houses 200,000 books. It's impressive and beautiful!

We also went to the National Museum- Archeology to see artifacts from ancient civilizations that lived in Ireland thousands of years ago. The country is unique among Europe since as it was out of the way it was able to preserve the evidence of early peoples. We saw gold jewelry, Viking-influenced weaponry and my favorite: bog bodies! Bob bodies are fascinating! The chemicals and ph levels of a bog naturally preserve human remains (and other items), and there are several remarkable examples in the museum. Some have almost perfectly preserved fingernails and hair. Sadly, most of the bodies were victims of pre-Christian cults that believed in human sacrifice.

Tomorrow I'll post about the adventures were had today driving our car (horrible!) and visiting a castle (awesome!). Too tired tonight...

Jackson Hole, Wyoming

We have come to Jackson Hole, Wyoming at the invitation of our wonderful and generous (practically) family Kiki and Grandma Lulu! We are just thrilled to be here and to have this adventure with them! 

The plane ride over was very special-what a treat to not have to go through security and big crowds at the airport. Then we arrived at our exclusive resort in our enormous home and were really wowed! It is humongous, sumptuously decorated and very comfortable. Right now we are lounging on the couches in the living room and are looking out at the Teton mountains through the floor to ceiling glass windows at the back of the house! We are going to be so spoiled after a vacation here...

Our first full day here was also amazing! We took a hot air balloon ride over Jackson Valley. We had a very early start and watched them blow up our balloon and a few others. Each basket has propane tanks that heat up the air (about 200 degrees at the top of the  balloon and causes the lift that takes you up in the air. It was so peaceful, especially since we had an unusually calm winds today. The views were spectacular! We saw the Teton mountains, Snake River, several towns, a herd of elk and lots of cattle. A very memorable experience!

We spent the rest of the day's enjoying the house and the pool at the resort a little ways up the road. Very fun and relaxing!

Made It Home!

We made it home late last night. It was a great flight until Orlando International was closed due to severe rainstorms and lightening, and we flew around waiting to see if it would open but had to divert to Tampa to land and refuel! We got into Orlando almost 3 hours late....so that made it a 12 hr flight!

We were a little jet lagged today but not too bad. I hugged my kids again and again! 

We are so grateful for a wonderful and safe trip, and that our kids were in such great hands with grandparents! Thanks again for your amazing love and support!

Hope to write again soon, we already know our next destination: Italy!

Last Day Until USA!!!

Today was our last day of sightseeing for our trip. In the morning we were able to go just a little ways out of town to visit an open air museum, which was a collection of working windmills, a cheese making shop and several other museums/demonstration centers to learn about Dutch life. My favourite was the wooden shoe shop! They had examples of many types of clogs including some with boot tops attached, with spikes one the bottom for ice and with beautiful scrolling decorations for a bride!

We also loved the windmill. The one we saw was built to press nuts or seeds to harvest the oil inside. They look so cute from the outside but inside they are very powerful! 

A fun surprise was meeting a nice woman named Sarah who lives in Jacksonville and is in Europe for work. She's a Tenn Vol! But we really enjoyed sharing our old SEC football stories with her and swapping travel stories. 

Later we went to a history museum about Amsterdam, I love hearing about how the Dutch built their great city on a marsh with poles supporting the buildings and how they continually push back the sea to gain more land. Much of Amsterdam is actually below sea level!

Then we went to the Anne Frank House. Wow, it was a very moving experience. It's amazing to me that those 8 people hid inside for 2 years. But after someone betrayed them they were all sent to camps. Only Anne's father survived the war, Anne died of typhus at a camp just months before the war ended. It also made me think of the great things young people can do. Like the Bible says, don't let people look down on you just because you are young!

Ruben and I are definitely ready to get back to the states and see our kids. This trip has been indescribable and we are so blessed to have seen new sights, meet interesting people and learned a little about life beyond our norm. 

Thanks for following along on this great journey! Hope another one will happen soon!