The following pictures are from July 7 & 8, and include The Dingle Peninsula Circle Tour, Dingle Town, Inch Beach and Killarney National Park. [View Full Entry]

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We hope you enjoy seeing some pictures from our first week in Ireland. If you want to read more in the blog, it was from June 30- July 6. [View Full Entry]

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Well, we have been home over a month now, and have begun to edit our photos - so far we are down by two thirds from 3000 to 1000! Don't worry, we wouldn't post them all, but we thought you might like to see a few. These are from our first days in France. (July 17-19), which we spent with our friends in Deauville and visiting the D-Day beaches and American cemetery. [View Full Entry]

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Sunday, August 9-Basilique du Sacré-Cœur, Musee Rodin, and Place du Trocadéro Dean went to the pool first thing, then we all went to 11 o’clock Mass at St. Peter’s in Neuilly-sur-Seine before boarding the metro for Sacré-Cœur, the mosque-like Cathedral on the highest hill in Paris. When we came up from the metro, the streets were mobbed! To get from the metro stop to the church, you walk up a narrow street, lined with shops and clogged with shoppers. At the end is a funicular that takes you up the equivalent of 2-3 steep blocks, but the line for the funicular [View Full Entry]

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Friday, August 7-Notre-Dame Cathedral, Sainte Chapelle, La Conciergerie We rise early so that Jeff and I can climb Notre-Dame’s tower. The line is already long at 9:00, and they do not open the gates until 9:30. Dean holds our place in line while Jeff and I see the inside of the Cathedral. Notre Dame was built on an island in the Seine River (Île de la Cité). It stands on the site of Paris' first Catholic church, Saint Etienne's Basilica. (Saint Etienne had been built over the site of a Roman temple to Jupiter.) Notre Dame's construction began in 1163. The [View Full Entry]

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We Have not been lost, but so busy that I have not had time to update. We leave for home this morning so I will have to post our last 5 days from US soil- hoping for not too much difficulty with taxis, check in, security and customs. See most of you soon! [View Full Entry]

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Wednesday, August 5 Museum of Jewish Art, Rue DesRosiers, Place des Vosges, Musee Shoah, and Dinner at Chartier’s Today is our last day with Jackie, so we want to do a few things that she might not have seen last year. I know that in the Caen museum, we had all been disappointed that the special exhibit on the Jewish children had been in French only. I had read that the Museum of Jewish Art had a special exhibit about the WW II deportations in France, so when Dean returns from the pool, we go there first. The security there is [View Full Entry]

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Monday, August 3 (part 2) Place de la Concorde, Jardin deTuileries, Musee L’Orangerie, Angelina’s, and Les Invalides The metro drops us at Place de la Concorde about 12:15, and we climb the stairs to our first real sight of central Paris. Turning 360 degrees, we can see the Egyptian Lexur obelisk (which is 3200 years old), the Jardin deTuileries, fountains, and the Eiffel tower in the distance. It’s difficult to believe we are really here. Jackie leads us through the gardens to Musee L’Orangerie, famous for its 360 degree Monet mural rooms. The [View Full Entry]

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Saturday, August 1- Chateau Chenonceau, Chateau Cheverny, and Chateau Chambord Dean and I begin the day in the patisserie with café au lait and croissants. We bring one home for Jeff (Jackie has gf bread, cereal and fruit in her bag) and wake them up to go to the chateau. Rain is predicted, so we bring our jackets. It is a five-minute walk through the village, down a tree-lined path, and across a bridge to Chateau Chenonceau. This chateau was begun in 1547, it is known as the chateau of the ladies. The owner’s wife supervised the building of the original [View Full Entry]

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Thursday, July 30-Fougeres, and the Forest of Paimpont (Brocliande) Today is our last day in St Jacques. When Dean returns from the pool, we pack a lunch and drive to Fougeres, another walled city, but this one with the chateau/castle restored. From the tourist info center, we walk past the points of interest to the church of St Leonard. Behind the church are amazing public gardens that cover the entire hill leading down into the old city to the chateau. One stairway is made of stone carved to look like logs, and the gardens are more wild/natural than manicured. It is [View Full Entry]

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