Sharing the road...:-)

"Phil, Stop!" :-)
(Too pretty to pass up!)

And we stopped again a little farther along....

Oh....just so beautiful...stone fence outside cemetery with steel gate!

Stone fence and narrow road leading to tower with modern windows, as you will see.

Finally, we reached the famous Cliffs of Moher. Phil took these four beautiful photos!

Afternoon sun on the ocean and the cliffs in shadow.

I just love these reminders of our drive in western Ireland....on these "main" roads!

Thickets of briars and brambles on both sides of the roadway.

Rolling hills; stone fences.

Western Ireland near the Cliffs of Moher.

As we made our way eastward, heading back to Dublin, we found the colorful doors in every town.

We stopped in Ennis (Inis), Ireland, and parked where that white van is in the photo above. Walked across the street to SuperMac for a sandwich "to go." The establishment (colors and menu) reminded us somewhat of MacDonald's.

When I got out of the car so that we could go across the street to SuperMac, I saw the statue (in the above photo) with birds sitting on it, and decided to take a picture....and then the birds just happened to fly away, allowing me to capture the photo below. :-)

The next day, March 15th, Dennis and Liz did some sightseeing in Dublin while Phil and I rested in our hotel room. We got out in time to do a little shopping (Blarney Woolen Mills, being one of the places) before meeting the Fledderjohanns for dinner. The above photo: Fledderjohanns on the streets of Dublin, Ireland.

Above: Phil and Dennis -- below: Liz and Myrna

Dinner downtown Dublin, which included a delicious soup and hearty bread!

Oh, and did I mention CHOCOLATE brownies for dessert????

Phil in the lobby of the Conrad Hotel, Dublin, Ireland, prior to our departure Tuesday morning, 3/16.

Do you remember me describing those six huge pillows on our bed at the Conrad??? :-)

Lobby, Conrad Hotel, Dublin, Ireland

Massive table, lobby of Conrad Hotel

Photo of a Dublin bridge as we rode in the taxi to the ferry port for our trip across the Irish Sea from Dublin to Holyhead, Wales.

The Irish Ferries ferry we enjoyed on our trip across the Irish Sea to Holyhead, Wales, where we would catch a train for our 4-hour trip across Wales and England to London.

Inside the Irish Ferries ferry

The four birds in the above photo flew alongside our ferry for several minutes before finally overtaking and passing us up! :-)

We had extra time between our arrival at Holyhead and our train departure, so Phil arranged for a taxi to drive us around so that we could see Holyhead, Wales. The kind gentleman, Allen, treated us to beautiful sites and also took us to the Treaddur Bay Hotel where we all enjoyed lovely bowls of soup and (again) hearty wholegrain bread. Yum!

Welsh sign for "Elderly People" -- Henoed

Holyhead, Wales

We had spent three days enjoying Edinburgh, Scotland, and it was time to begin our journey that would take us to Ireland. The first part of the jaunt was a train from Edinburgh to Glasgow. Above is a picture of my beloved PJ (wearing his glasses, which I really like, on that particular day) on the train.

Dennis and Liz across the aisle from us, and Liz enjoying the morning sun as it shone on her face.

The train that delivered us to Glasgow....

...and the Fledderjohanns & Phil seated where we waited in the Glasgow train station until time to board the train that would take us to Ayr, Scotland on our next portion of the journey to Ireland.

Due to work being done on a portion of the track on which we would normally have ridden a train direct from Glasgow to Stranraer, we took a train from Glasgow to Ayr, south of which were the non-operating train tracks. After a brief "layover" in the Ayr train station, we boarded a large tour bus for the brief and final portion of our trip to Stranraer, the port city where we would catch the ferry to Belfast, Northern Ireland.

There was just a handful of us on the large bus, so Phil and I opted to "spread out" and enjoy two seats each rather than "snuggling" next to one another on the bus. :-) (If you've ridden a tour bus, you *know* what I mean by snuggling. ha) Above is a photo of my darlin' PJ.

Dennis and Liz, "snuggling" on the bus across the aisle from me. :-)
(Notice poor Dennis's knees with NO room to move!)

Our bus ride was wonderful, because the roadway we traveled from Ayr to Stranraer was a narrow, 2-lane very scenic "highway" that took us right through the heart of several small towns (in contrast to train tracks that pass through the "back side" of towns). So close were the structures to the roadway that sometimes I felt as though, if my bus window had been open, I could have reached out and touched a building! A beautiful little church in one of those towns.

I was fascinated by this huge castle-type home in the center of a small town, and its likewise huge "horse pen" (instead of a grassy yard) on a corner lot!

More photos taken from the tour bus as we rode from Ayr to Stranraer. I thought, as we rode past many sturdy stone walls out in a field with no roof (such as the one in the photo above), "Wonder how old this structure is? and WHERE in the United States would I see such as this?"

Oh, the serene, rolling hills of Scotland...and not nearly as green as they will be during the spring and summer seasons.

A patch of crocuses in the park of a small town......

....and sheep & lambs (you know I *love* 'em!) in one of many, many pastures.