Ireland

Ireland:

After the choir headed back to Dallas, I headed on to Ireland and met up my friend Kateen from Seattle. We rented a cute little red car and embarked on an incredible journey down Ireland's winding roads. It was above and beyond what either of us had expected.

Our Irish welcome heading into Dingle Ireland...a much needed change of luck after having had our rental car backed into by a bizarre little Irish man only 2 hours into our road trip. Dingle was a wonderful quaint little Irish fishing town filled with friendly people, amazing food, and wonderful live Irish music.

Just one of 100's of pictures I took of Ireland's beautiful coastline.

This little sheep thought he was king of the hill. He just stood there and watched as we laughed and laughed at him.

The Long and Winding Road

This picture was taken along the coastline of the Dingle Peninsula...sometimes there was barely room for us to squeeze by, which made for numerous "hold your breath moments"!

Stained glass in a little pub we stopped at for lunch. I believe it was in Levenworth. We of course had the soup of the day, which in Ireland is always vegetable.

A very common occurance when traveling in Ireland...herding sheep down the road.

The little port of Roundstone. It was cloudy when we arrived and then the sun finally managed to peek through.

Somewhere near Clifden I believe. What a gorgeous day...I guess the more accurate way to say it, is "what a gorgeous moment." The weather in Ireland is constantly changing throughout the day and can be rainy and cloudy, then sunny, then foggy, then rainy and cloudy again.

This time instead of the usual sheep herding we got to herd cows.

Kylemore Castle (1868) We lucked out and got there just in time to take a few pictures before it started pouring down rain.

Sigh...this reminds me of New Zealand. Absolutely beautiful.

Seriously...the best salad I have ever tasted...hands down. Yes I realized that there's really not too much in way of "salad" per say, but maybe that's why it was the best I've ever had:) It was quite un-expected seeing as we were in the tiny little surfing town of Strandhill...yes I know, surfing in Ireland? In the morning we went for a refreshing jog on the beach.

Strandhill Beach: The beginning of a spectacular sunset...get ready, I tried to condense the 100+ I took to just a few. Not easy!

Me on the beach just before the sky cleared up a bit and everyone in town came out to watch the sunset.

One of the local kiddos, enjoying the evening.

Yeah...it was an amazing evening:)

On our way to the cliffs of Slieve League...we just had to stop and explore one of the many little dirt roads.

Ok...talk about holding your breath...this was the little road winding up to the the cliffs of Slieve League...supposedly the highest sea cliffs in Europe. The only thing between us and the drop-off was the make-shift fence you see.

Sheep, sheep, everywhere...the top of the cliffs were no exception. They seemed to be oblivious to the fact that were teetering on the edge of certain doom if they slipped.

Behind every picture is a story and this one is certainly no exception. After coming down from the cliffs we passed through the little village and I happened to see 3 older Irishmen sitting on the bench, fully engrossed in their ice cream. Being an extreme ice cream fan I couldn't resist having Kateen pull over the car. I'm sure they thought I was a complete nut as I ran over and asked to take their picture, but they agreed and it's probably my favorite of the entire trip.