At long last, the blog has been disinfected and virus free.  Welcome back.

We took off again this summer, this time to northern Europe. We started with Ireland.   It became clear why it is called the Emerald Island. Beautiful green fields were everywhere. And probably the most beautiful flowers we’ve seen anywhere.   Of course, as one of the locals said, “If it rains every day, you can have green fields and beautiful flowers.” We did see a lot of rain – gentle rain – but a fine rain during some part of almost every day.

Of course we visited Callan, Ireland. Found some Callan graves in an old, old cemetery, (fortunately none was mine). We stayed in a lovely bed and breakfast and enjoyed walking the streets of Callan.

We were in Ireland, so we had to visit the Blarney Castle, which almost demands that one kiss the Blarney Stone. The stone was set into a tower of the castle a few years back – in 1446. The legend is that if you kiss the Blarney Stone, you will receive the gift of eloquence, or nowadays, the gift of gab.

The word blarney is often used to indicate a person is a flatterer, and not necessarily sincere. But Irishman John O’Conner Power said, “Blarney is something more than mere flattery. It is flattery sweetened by humor and flavored by wit.” That’s the essence of the Irish.

Kissing the Blarney Stone is not an easy thing to do. As my back was not in great shape that day (and some said I did not need to get any more gift of gab), I did not kiss the Blarney Stone. It is not a simple task. You must lie on your back, hanging out over the edge of the castle about four stories above the ground. (There are some bars to insure that you won’t fall to the ground.)

Still, we couldn’t visit the castle without one of us kissing the Blarney Stone. So, Earlene did. I’m sure I’ll never hear the end of that.

We visited the graves of St. Patrick and W.B. Yeats. St. Patrick is credited with driving the snakes out of Ireland, and there seems to be no snakes there to this day. Yeats is not the most famous Irish author, but in the top few and a writer should not go to Ireland and fail to visit Yeats. We also had lunch with the son of famous Irish playwright/author John B. Keane. And naturally, one of my generation would visit the area where The Quiet Man was filmed.

Other memories include lots of sheep, many fascinating small towns, beautiful countryside, hundreds of churches and cathedrals older than the U.S., and so much more. It was a great visit.

Ireland was only the start of our adventure, but I won’t bore you with more – today.

Anybody want to add their fond memories of the Emerald Island? Just leave a comment. And if you’d like to hear less, or more, about our northern Europe adventure, leave a comment “More” or “Less.”