Thursday, June 19, 2008 Killarney to Waterford, Ireland We were keen to leave Killarney after one night. So, we plotted a route to the south to Kenmare. This town was recommended to us just before we left by our closing attorney. She said it was a fun town and a good alternative to Killarney. We had already decided that we would not do the famous ‘Ring of Kerry’ on this trip. We were satisfied that the Dingle Peninsula would suffice for this vacation. We needed to leave at least one highlight for a return trip. As we drove south we entered the Killarney National Forest. Just on the entrance is the “Muckross House.” It is a mansion built in the nineteenth century. Queen Victoria spent three nights there once. It was owned by a rich English ... read more

Tuesday, June 17, 2008 D’Arcy of Galway, Ireland With plenty of advice from former D’Arcy pilgrims (Dianne, Rick, Josh, Paul, Eric, etc.), we decided that today we would search out what we could of the family, D’Arcy of Galway. We had read in the Rick Steve’s guidebook that there were 14 significant, ruling families in the middle ages in Galway. They are more commonly known here as the tribes of Galway. D’Arcy is one of them. We also knew that a former vicar of the St. Nicolas Collegiate Church was John D’Arcy and that a banner in the church had the crests of all 14 families. We wanted to find more. We asked around a bit and found a few more locations of the crests. One was in the middle of the main park in the ... read more

Saturday, June 14, 2008 Portrush, Northern Ireland We knew when we woke that we had cleared the dreaded day. It was no longer the 13th. That was good. We checked out of the no-star hotel and headed west about 9:00am in our new BMW. Jackie set Bonnie to find today’s target, Cairnryan, Scotland. This is where we were booked to catch the ferry to sail over to Larne, Northern Ireland. The day was beautiful, clear and cool. Bonnie said that we had about seventy miles to our destination. The ship was to sail at 10:45am, so we felt that we had plenty of time. The drive was really nice. There were many small villages along the way. The only hitch was my need to re-fuel. When they gave me the rental car, it only had a ... read more

Thursday, June 12, 2008 Edinburgh, Scotland We like the hotel that we found in Edinburgh. We are not crowded; it has free parking, internet service and breakfast. Those are the essentials. Plus, we are near a bus stop where we have been able to catch a bus into the middle of town. The bus cost 1.10 pound each way per person. We might be able to walk from here but why when you can ride that cheap. We started early on Thursday and went immediately to the top of the Royal Mile to the Edinburgh Castle. We entered and paid the fee of 21 pounds ($42) for entry and a single audio tour machine. My Ipod headphones would plug in so we used the old Siamese twin trick and walked around bound at the hip listening ... read more

Tuesday, June 10, 2008 York, England We said our farewells to Pete & Hilary and headed north before nine this morning. It was sad to say goodbye to such great hosts. I made a couple of photos of Peter’s babies (collector autos) before leaving. They look great. He is a master of the automobile. Our target for today was a small town well north of London named Bourne. Our route was developed by Pete after discussing with us what we were interested in seeing. He worked out a very detailed plan which we intend to use as our travel guide. So, we set out. The first leg out of Romsey had a lots of turns so Peter offered to help lead us for the first 4-5 miles. As we approached the intersection where we were to ... read more