Last stop - Ireland

Friday  8/2/13

We dropped our car off at the Manchester airport and met up with our friends Martin and Carol.  They picked us up at the airport and took us around Manchester and then for a tour of the countryside.  They even stopped at a church called the Oldham Parish where Gloria's great great great grandparents had been married back in the 1850's.  We ended up at an English pub and had a wonderful meal with our friends.  They ended the day by taking us to the airport so we could catch a flight on Aer Lingus and leave England and head for our final leg of the journey to Ireland.  Thank you to Martin and Carol for a great day and for showing us a great time.  Hope to see them in the U.S. some time. 

We ended the day by flying to Dublin and then taking a bus to our hotel for the night, we would pick the car up in the morning.

Saturday  8/3/13

We arrived at the airport at around 10:30 and picked up our final rental car.  We got on the road by 12:00 and decided to head down to County Cork and stay there.  It was about a 4 hour drive.  We ended up at a place called Garrettstown  house which had camping at an old estate.  We set up camp then went to Kinsale to get dinner and see this very quaint fishing village.  We didn't get back to our site until 11:00.  

Sunday  8/4/13  

We drove from Cork to the Dingle Peninsula.  We found camping at a little place and we were able to walk to the North Atlantic Ocean and wander the beach.  What a beautiful place ; sandy beaches and spectacular views.  We drove over a pass called Connor Pass and were able to get out and do a little hiking.  This may well be the prettiest place we have been to.  The hills with the different shades of green, the sheep, and all the stone fences to separate the land parcels as well as the water on both sides of the pass.  We thoroughly enjoyed this part of Ireland.  We drove the coast road and saw many sites and enjoyed the beauty.

Monday  8/5/13

This is our day to head back to Dublin so we just took our time and got in around 17:00 we found our final hotel and then headed into town to explore and to have our final supper.  We drove into Dublin and had a wonderful meal of Irish stew and fish and chips.  We wandered for a bit and we were able to see the medieval viking section with buildings and walls and even a pub dating back to the 1100's.  We ended our night by walking and seeing many street musicians perform.  

Tuesday  8/6/13

Well this is our day of departure.  We left for the airport around 8:00 to drop off our rental car.  We decided to be early because we had security and customs to go through and our flight leaves at 11:10.  We made it through all the hoops and are now on the plane headed for Philadelphia, and then to Chicago.  We will then rent a car and drive up to our home while Kjersten stays at the airport and flies home to Montana the next morning.  We have really enjoyed our trip and we really do appreciate what we have and where we live.  God has been good to us.  We have enjoyed meeting countless people and sharing our life with them as they have with us.  The places we have seen have been beautiful.  We loved seeing all the different cultures and opening our eyes to a BIG world.  Thank you all for your prayers for us on this trip they were greatly appreciated.  Hope to see each one of you and to share our stories with you.  Good bye for now.

On to Great Britian

Monday, 7/29/13

We awoke to the hotel's fire alarm at 7:20 this morning.  We didn't hear anyone rushing out and didn't smell smoke so we just waited it out in our room.  The alarm stopped a few minutes later.  False alarm.

Today we pick up our rental car by the docks and begin our 5 day tour of the island. 

Picked up our car it is a manual transmission 5 speed.  The driver is on the right side.  It looks like all those years with Mark driving the scarry paid off.  We decided to head north and check out London for a bit.  We found it difficult at first to get used to the round abouts and just figuring out the directions.  After a while it was no problem.  We decided to park the car around 30 miles east of London at lakeside and then take the train into town.  We were able to get a group ticket for around 30 euros.  We really enjoyed London and really found the town clean.  There were lots of street entertainers and food vendors.  We enjoyed both very much.

We decided to leave town by 21:30 and take the train back to the car.  We made it back and it was dark so we figured we would head north a few miles and find a hotel for the night.  We had a lot of fun trying to get out of lakeside.  After around 30 minutes we made it.  Round abouts are a lot of fun.  We made it to our destination of Chelmsford and bedded down for the night.

Tuesday  7/30/13

We headed north to the North Sea and found a campsite at the Village of South Shields on the Marsden Bay.  It was a very nice spot.  Not much to say about the day except that we drove a bit and we were very tired.  We walked to the sea and found this place called the Grotto that was carved out of the limestone cliffs by a family back in the 1800's.  We walked the beach fora while and Kjersten explored a cave.  The way to get down to the beach was through an elevator that was on the face of the cliff.  We finally found a little pub and had a nice meal of fish and chips and chicken kiev, very good.

Wednesday  7/31/13

This was the day that we were going to drive up to Scotland.  We picked Sterling to go and visit because that is where we found camping.  Our trip was pretty uneventful as we drove up there.  We did stop at the border of England and Scotland right at the top of the pass and watched a man play bagpipes while Mark and Gloria got a burger from the concession up there.  We also stopped to see a monument of William Wallace that was made around the 1500's.  Sterling is a very strategic town in that whoever controls Sterling and the castle controls Scotland because of the mountains on one side and the marshland on the other.  This is where the newer monument of William Wallace is located.  We had dinner in Sterling that night as well as ice cream.  It seemed to rain a lot in Scotland which made it difficult to put our tent away but there is always the next night that may be a little drier.  Our campsite was very beautiful right at the base of the ochli hills.  There were sheep all around us and it was very green.

Thursday  8/1/13

This day consisted of us driving down from Scotland to Lancaster, England to camp there and then meet up with some friends that we met back in Switzerland.  We found a nice campsite on the beach of the Irish Sea.  We walked the beach, had dinner and went to bed.  The driving seemed to tire us all out.

On to Amsterdam then the Mother Country

riday  7/26/13

Well we woke up on the train and found out that we will be getting into Amsterdam an hour late.  We decided to  find a place to stay, we went to info. again and the gal pointed us to take the train to Spoornwoude and it was only a short walk from there to camping.  We asked a man after we got off the train if he knew the place and he directed us on a wild goose chase.  At least we got to see the town.  We finally found our camping and we set up.  We decided to head back  in to Amsterdam and wander.  We actually hopped on a boat tour and  we were able to see quite  a lot of the city and gain a little history.  Amsterdam is named for the river that goes through it and then they put a dam on it.  The rivers name is the Amstel so Amsteldam or Amsterdam.  Just a freebie.  After wandering for a bit we took  the train to Haarlem, a town we want to visit on Sat.   We went back to our campsite and called it a night.

Saturday   7/27/13

Saturday came and we loaded up and headed to Haarlem a little town where a family called the Ten Booms hid some Jews from the Nazis.  We were able to tour the town and go to an open air market while we waited for our tour to start.  We got back to the Ten Boom museum and noticed the English tour time was changed from 12:00 to 13:00 and that was going to cut us short on our train schedule.  There was  this lady who questioned the change and got us in earlier.  The tour lasted an hour and was  very interesting.  He who blesses the Jewish people will be blessed and he who curses them will be cursed.  In this family's  life you can see how God blessed them.  One way was the way they were able to have a Bible while they were in a concentration camp, they had fleas in their barracks and the nazis would not enter  so they never knew about the Bible.  

We finally headed to the train and heading towards Belgium.   We arrived with a little more info. than normal so we found  it O.K.  While we were waiting and figuring out the busses this young couple asked if we were camping and they were wondering if they could tag along.  Their names were  Walter and Elishka from the Czech Republic.  They were both students and traveling through Europe together. He is studying engineering and she pharmacy.  We found our campsite for the night and decided to do a bit of laundry.  While doing laundry we met a lady from Spain who didn't know English and we knew very little Spanish, lets just say a very interesting conversation.  A little later we met Andre from Norway who was biking from Denmark to London around a 1500 kilometer ride.  We talked a bit and let him use the remainder of our dryer time.  We have been able to get some contact info. from these people and we will keep up with them that way.  We had quite a storm that night but slept amazing. 

Sunday 7/28/13  

I forgot to mention that we camped in Brugge, Belgium.  We decided to tour the town and get some fries, waffles and chocolate.   Rough life right?  The feel of the town was quiet and relaxed, unlike the larger cities where it was busy, hurried and noisy.  We did get our Belgian fries, waffles, and chocolate.  After taking many pictures of the beautiful architecture,  we then headed back to the train station to catch our train to Calias, France on the coast.  We had planned to camp there and take a ferry across the English Channel to the UK in the morning.  We could not find any camping so we decided to catch a ferry right away for Dover, England.  We arrived at the ferry office 50 minutes before the next ferry left and got tickets.  The ferry ride was only 1 1/2 hours.  It was beautiful weather and we were able to enjoy the trip out on the deck.  We arrived in Dover at about 8:30 pm and found a hotel close to the docks.  It was a treat to sleep in a bed for the night.