Forty Shades of Green

As we near the end of our adventure, we're slowing down a bit on the sightseeing.  However, during the week we've been in Ireland, we've already driven over 1000 kilometers (on the left side of the road, I might add), so maybe we haven't slowed down that much.  After our overnight ferry crossing from France, we started our Irish tour with a visit to the Blarney Stone to get the gift of gab.  Jonah was hoping this would enable him to talk his way out of his remaining school work.  Unfortunately for him, I kissed the stone too, so I was able to talk him right back into it.

Jonah does his part to try to get the gift of gab

From Blarney Castle, we proceeded to Callan, the ancestral Tobin town.  After all the old bridges, churches and towns we've seen in our nearly 5 months of traveling, it was a different experience to see some with a real family connection and to know that our kids' ancestors walked these same roads.

The ruins of the old cathedral in Callan and the bridge that still spans the river today.

We've since driven both the Ring of Kerry and the Dingle Peninsula loop, and thanks to Rick, we were able to avoid chains of massive tour busses on the narrow, winding roads.  Did I mention that I'm driving on the left side?  We visited the Rock of Cashel, a number of stone ring forts, the Cliffs of Moher, and the Burren--several quintessential Irish sites.  The weather has been a bit cool and quite windy, and, of course, we've had some rain, but the landscapes are magnificent.  The hills truly are, as Johnny Cash said, 40 shades of green.

The Rock of Cashel

Ring fort on a rainy dayJust a few of the 40 shades

Cliffs of Moher

In addition to our sightseeing and learning about Irish history, we have picked up a new pasttime--pitch and putt.  I'm not sure if this is something that exists in the US, but I think it may be the equivalent of par-3 golfing (well, not for us . . . ).  This has been an interesting and humbling activity, but the scenery is fabulous!

This week, we will drive across Ireland and end our time here with three days in Dublin.  Then, it's on to London for 5 days, and back home, via Washington DC, where we will spend a long weekend visiting with Tom's family.  As the end of our trip draws near, we find ourselves thinking of our lives at home--our friends, our home, our cat, our legos.  We are excited to be reunited with the people and things we have missed, although it's hard to imagine the end of our adventure.  Jonah and Sierra are both working on writing their reflections on our experiences (OK, it's not a voluntary activity, but they're reflecting nonetheless).  Perhaps some day I will have my own reflections to share.  For now, I think I'm blogged out!  However, as Tom noted, a picture is worth a thousand words (or at least 5 megabytes), so I will try to keep posting some of those until the trip is done.  Thanks to those of you who have followed along over these months.  It's been fun sharing our stories and knowing that there are actually a few people out there who want to read them.  We love you all and look forward to sharing more stories, and slideshows (short, I promise!) upon our return.