Paris and beyond...

First of all - apologies for taking so long between posts. We've been crazy busy making our way around France. After arriving in the port town of Cherbourg on the Normandy coast on Monday the 20th we headed to beautiful and amazing Paris where we spent Tuesday and Wednesday night. For those of you who have only experienced Paris with Hollywood assistance I can assure you that no movie has truly done this incredible place justice. Everywhere we turned there was something else to see or do. After spending our first afternoon checking out some of the architecture we ended up at the Eiffel Tower as the sun went down and the lights came up. It is so much bigger in person than I had imagined!! Here are a few picutures to enjoy:

The two of us from the ferry as Ireland drifts away in the background.

Arc de Triomphe Etiole in the setting sun.

Fountain in the Place de la Concorde with Eiffel Tower in the background.

The Eiffel Tower all lit up. This taken looking south from across the River Seine.

Looking down to some of the garden area from the Chateau de Versailles.

Back in Paris looking at the Glass Pyramid - the main entrance to the Musee du Louvre.

On our second day we took a day trip to Versailles to check out the cool palace (chateau) and even cooler (and ginormous) gardens. Then it was back into Paris where we went to the Louvre and checked out as much as we could - including of course the Mona Lisa and the statue of Venus. After the museum we headed east along the Seine to the Cathedral Notre Dame. And then had a killer dinner at a little cafe that we finished with French coffee (with Cognac) and a delicious crepe.

On Thursday it was off to Nantes (birthplace of Jules Verne for all you literature buffs) where we spent a night and checked out a very cool castle built by the Dukes of Brittany in the 1500's. We are now down further south in Bordeaux planning the next stage of our adventure... we'll keep you posted...

All smiles in Paris!!

Sunset in Paris on the River Seine.

More Pictures!!

Ryan in a passageway at Blarney Castle. (wearing shorts - which is a sure-fire way to stand out over here - nobody wears shorts!)
Blarney Castle from the lovely garden area surrounding it. The Blarney Stone is at the top of the castle on the left edge as you are viewing this. Quite a narrow set of spiral stairs all the way to the top.

If you look really, really hard you can see America through the fog... This was taken while taking the Ring of Kerry Tour out of Killarney.

The Cliffs of Moher. A bit of a tourist trap but it's hard to argue with scenery like this.

A bit of love on a windy day overlooking the Cliffs of Moher.

Leah at our our sweet campsite in in a farmers field while on the Burren Way between Ballyvaughn and Doolin. At this point the ground was only damp but after the stormy night it turned into a swampy marsh.

View from the Burren Way of the Aran Islands off the west coast of Ireland.

View from the top of a hill on the Burren Way looking toward our next hill challenge.

The Burren Way before the climb just outside the village of Ballyvaughan.

One the road before arriving in Ballyvaughan on our way from Kinvara.

Traditional Irish thatch roof.

Leah at the harbor in Galway.

(I'm pretty sure these pictures are in reverse chronological order)

We've made it all the way down to the city of Cork. Another sweet place with tons of history - including the nearby town of Blarney wherein you can find Blarney Castle at the top of which one can find the famous Blarney Stone. Yes, Leah and I have kissed the Blarney Stone and will now be gifted with eloquence beyond imagination!! It was a super-touristy thing but worth it. The castle itself was really awesome because it has been kept in such great condition.

Ireland has been incredibly awesome. We enjoyed getting out of the big cities and into the little villages the most. The people have all been very welcoming to us, especially in Northern Ireland along the north-eastern coast. We have had dozens of offers for 'lifts' from people and tons of smiles all around. We were even invited in for tea on more than one occasion by people we met along the road. Although it is a pretty small island there is an amazing amount of history here. And the beauty of the place was more than I had expected - especially once we got into the hills with the ancient rock fences and clear streams.

These will be the last pictures from the island of Ireland as we are heading to France this Sunday via ferry. We have completed a fairly complete loop of Ireland and have jammed as much into every day as humanly possible. There are of course hundreds of things we've missed but we'll just have to save those for our next little trip. Hope you enjoy these pictures (including some of our faces per parental request) and we'll post again once we land in France.

doing the tourist thing...

Today we're in Killarney and will be taking the 'Ring of Kerry' tour. We've been making our way down the west coast after spending last Thursday and Friday in Galway we began hiking south in an area called 'The Burren'. It is a geologically interesting place with tons of exposed limestone. We camped out on top of a mountain after a couple of brutal uphill sections on Sunday night. It rained and blew really hard. We got a bit wet but were none the worse for wear. We then trekked down the mountain into a little town called Doolin where we treated ourselves to a nice night in a decent hotel. At a pub in Doolin we were again treated to some sweet traditional Irish music. It was then onto the Cliffs of Moher (which was a major tourist trap - but really quite beautiful) before ending up last night in Killarney.

We plan on spending the next couple of days here in Killarney and checking out the lakes and mountains around here. There is a national park and some great forested land all around this town. After this its on to Cork and probably will be taking a ferry this weekend sometime to get over into northern France. We'll post again with more details and hopefully some pictures from the west coast of Ireland!

Pictures!

View from the Ulster way just west of Ballycastle
There were dozens of these 'skines' that we used to cross fences.
Castle at Carickfergus
View down off of west point of Rathlin Island near bird sanctuary
Lots of sheep and even more baby lambs - so very cute!!
The basalt pillars at the Giants Causeway
One of the many murals in Free Derry
Yep - we took the tour and then drank some whiskey...

Just a note: these pictures are not in any sort of chronological order.

Heading to the west coast

We've made it around the northern tip of Ireland and have spent the last two nights in Derry (or Londonderry depending on whom you ask - but we were told it would be best to just call it Derry). This is where Bloody Sunday took place in 1972. This is a very old place with an amazing town centre. The old town in known as the 'walled city' and is completely surrounded by a rock wall that is up to 35 plus feet thick in places! We walked around the top of the entire wall and were able to see some amazing things. We also checked out Free Derry, an area in the neighborhood of Bogside where Bloody Sunday occured. There are many murals on the buildings painted by local artists representing the history of 'The Troubles' as they are called here. It was a very crazy feeling walking on the streets we've all seen in the news with barricades and tear gas in the background. A somewhat somber feeling but pretty powerful indeed.

Anyway - we're heading down to Galway on the west coast today. The weather has been a bit wet lately but looks to be be clearing for Easter weekend. The west coast is supposed to be quite dramatic and beautiful - we'll let you know. And hopefully we will someday find a computer somewhere that lets us plug in and upload some of our hundreds of photos... (sorry)...

Running out of time on the this computer... must post. Later everyone!

IT'S BEAUTIFUL HERE!

Hi all, we hope you are doing wonderful! Unfortunately we don't get to use a computer very often so we aren't updating our blog too much yet. When we do find a computer it doesn't allow us to put our pictures up because they have all the towers locked. Anyway, we have almost made it to the tip of Northern Ireland! We're having a fabulous time and have been very fortunate with the weather. We started in Dublin and then up to Belfast by train which was a nice, scenic ride. From Belfast we started walking/backpacking quite frequently. We've spent each night in a different town more Northern than the last. We've been staying in hostels, B & B's and we camped one night. We climbed a couple of giant mountains and camped at the top with lots of sheeps. So far we are averaging 8-10 miles a day with our 30-40 pound

backpacks...which I admit is quite a challenge. We are definitely sore but seem to be improving our distance each day. We hope to get somewhere up near 15-20 miles per day. It's hard to walk far here though because there are so many sites to stop and see and people keep offering us "lifts." So far, we've gotten several rides from families, hostel owners and people who want to chat with Americans. We are having a blast and really getting to relax and enjoy the "slow" life. The people here are incredibly nice, it's quite amazing! Last night and tonight we are staying in Ballycastle.

Today we got an early start out to Rathlin Island and hiked about 9 miles. Absolutely breathtaking views! Next week we will probably be on the West Coast and have better access to the internet as there are some major cities there. It's interesting and quite funny walking through the cities like Dublin and Belfast with our giant backpacks on. We hope everyone is well and feel free to comment, we love hearing from you all back home!

Hello from Belfast

After spending some time in Dublin we have traveled north by train to Belfast in Northern Ireland. It is a very mello town with some very friendly people. We are heading out this afternoon to begin backpacking up the eastern coast and around the northern edge of the country. We'll probably be out on the trails for the next 10 days or so. We are having an incredible time and have seen some beautiful country so far - and expect to see much more in the days to come. We'll make sure and post some pictures as soon as we can.