Chapter 2....

Ok friends....Now that our big adventure has concluded, it's time to start another one! This will be Chapter 2 of Christi's big adventure. I am planning to go back to London and take an English languange teaching course that will enable me to teach english to non-english speaking people all over the world. It's a four week course and I am hoping to start on Sept. 19.

I'm leaving for London on August 22nd and going to do some more traveling with my friend, Elena before starting the course. So, here I go on another adventure! Wish me luck!

You can always email me at christiscorp@yahoo.com

Last stop...Dublin!

With just a day in Dublin, we decided to take the hop on/hop off bus tour. This is a great way to see a lot of the city and decide where you want to spend more time after the tour. We caught the bus just off of Grafton Street which is a great pedestrian shopping area with tons of stores. We looped all around Dublin and saw the infamous Christchurch Cathedral, the Trinity College and so many of Dublin's great spots.

We "hopped off" at the Guinness Brewery and had a great tour of all that is Guinness, with a final stop at the top of the 7 story building where we were rewarded with a pint of Guinness! Being that we did have to "hop" back on the bus, we didn't drink the entire pint!

After the bus tour, we headed over to Temple Bar which is a really old part of Dublin and is filled with little restaurants, shops and tons of bars. The Temple Bar, one of the most famous, was having a Guinness Book of World Records event and we stopped in for awhile to check it out. Dave Brown was attempting to play the guitar for 100 hours straight! You can see him live right now on www.templebarevents.com...we saw him on Monday night and he will be playing until Thursday!!! Anyway, it was pretty cool to see a Guinness world record attempt just after being at the Guinness Brewery. We then headed to another pub with traditional Irish music and had dinner and listened to the live Irish Folk songs for the last time...boo hoo! All in all, we really loved Ireland, our mother land, and can't wait to go back and see more of it!

Dingle!

We headed down to the Dingle Peninsula to check out the sights and we weren't disappointed! We found our dream homesite...it's that little stone house on the top of the cliff above the secluded beach...heaven! It's a fixer, but we are up for it! Our drive around the peninsula was just amazing and every corner we turned was a new gorgeous view. The water is crystal clear blue and the hills are so emerald green. We can see why they call it the "Emerald Isle"!

We also went out to the Blarney Castle! Kissed the Blarney Stone!!! It was quite a harrowing adventure as you can see in the photo...it's three large stories up into the castle, you hang upside down over the edge of the castle...have a mini heart attack, then kiss the stone upside down while this old guy supports you as you lean back and hope he doesn't drop you down the side of the castle! But we can say we did it...that's all that matters, right? The castle was really great too. The gardens are spectacular and the property is beautiful.

We also went to a great little pub in Tralee and Keely had her very first sip of beer...ever! Of course it was Guinness! Don't worry...she only took the one sip! I drank the rest :) But you have to have some Guinness in Ireland!

Ireland at last!

We finally made it to Ireland and started our trip in a little town on the west coast called Doolin. It did take two, twelve hour days of traveling...in taxi's, on buses, ferries, trains and a rental car! But we made it and have decided that the roads here in Ireland are great compared to the roads in Scotland...no offense to Scotland.

We found a great cave in Doolin with the largest stalactite in Europe! It was so interesting and we got to go down into the cave and see all kinds of wonderful "cave stuff". After our cave adventure we headed out into the wilds of western Ireland and found the Cliffs of Moher which were made up of layers and layers of silt deposited over millions of years. It was SUPER WINDY up there and very cold!!! We almost got blown off the top! But the view was worth it.

Next stop was The Burren...or the surface of the moon...whichever you may prefer. It is the craziest place with smooth limestone that was originally a tropical sea, then the material was crushed by the glaciers and smoothed out into what you see in the picture. Very interesting and such a contrast to the vibrant green hills surrounding it.

Doolin is also known for it's Traditional Irish music and we were able to visit a couple of pubs and here some great sounding stuff!

Isle of Skye...more of Scotland's gorgeous scenery!

The Isle of Skye is one of the many little islands off the west coast of Scotland and has the most amazing landscapes. We stayed in Protree this little harbor town and our guest house is the pink one in the picture. Super cute and the hosts were wonderful. We drove around the entire island and found some beautiful spots, as you can see in these pictures. We hiked up a very steep mountain to get to The Old Man of Storr, a volcanic plug (Keely and I are standing in the forground) and also these amazing cliffs called Kilt Rock because the layers of volcanic rock look like the pleats of a kilt. The island was breathtaking! The only odd thing was that as we were driving around on these one lane roads...little lambs would just be walking in the middle of the road and we would have to come to a complete stop for them and wait for them to saunter off to the side :) My left side driving skills were put to the test here, but I am feeling very accomplished now!

After a long day of driving we were off to the nearsest pub where we found this great guitar player who "forced" me to play the tambourine and later dubbed me "Whiskey" and Keely was to be "Tequila" for the rest of the evening...our new Scottish names...and no I wasn't drinking whiskey...he asked me my name and thought I said whiskey instead of Christi! Ha! Those Scottish lads are so amusing!

Inverness, Scotland...where is the monster?

So we came to Inverness in search of the Loch Ness Monster...no monster, but lots' of castles! We saw Cowdor Castle that is still in use by it's owners. The Cowders...go figure. We saw an old ruined castle, on the shores of Loch Ness, and we saw a castle that has been rebuilt and is just for show now. They were all glorious in their own way.

We rented a car for this part of our journey...and drove on the opposite side of the road, opposite side of the car and the stick shift was on the left! Quite and adjustment and very scary for a day or so...but then I got the hang of it and now I am a pro! Good thing too because we have a lot more driving to do in Ireland!

We had some cool weather but enjoyed it and Scotland is so green it's hard to believe. After all the castle -going we are heading out to the Isle of Skye to see more of Scotland's gorgeous landscape!

Edinburgh, Scotland...plaid is king

Edinburgh was a nice ride up from London on the train...no changes! That means no getting off the train and lugging the heavy bags up and down a ton of stairs and so on...Nice!

Our guest house was beautiful and comfortable and an easy bus ride or walk into town. The Edinburgh Castle was first on the list of things to do. It was an all day affair with lots' to see and so much history. Our weather was not very cooperative but we managed to stay fairly dry.

After the Castle we sauntered down the Royal Mile which is a long street with lots of shopping and restaurants and such. We shopped and shopped and found some great Celtic Jewelry and some plaid...we had to! We ended up in a great little pub with a group of people that were playing Scottish folk music. It started out with four and grew and grew until there were about 10 by the time we left...all playing different instruments. It was a real treat to listen to this group and the Scottish pub food is excellent! Keely even found a great new favorite drink...ginger beer (non alcoholic!). Edinburgh is an old and elegant city with so many magnificent buildings and little steep alleyways called "closes" that drop you down from street to street. We loved it!

Next day look ominous and so we opted for a bus tour around the city and down to see the Britania, the decommissioned Royal Yacht. We figured we could stay inside the bus if it poured, but we were lucky and it was not so bad. The Britania was amazing and it was so interesting to see where so many diplomats and the Royals hung out. Our tour of the city was very informative and we had lunch at the Botanical Gardens. The city is filled with young people due to the University being in town and it feels so safe and has a very friendly feel to it. But...on to Inverness to see the Loch Ness Monster!