Day 13 - A Family Day

Yesterday was day 13 of the trip. We cooked another big breakfast down in the coach house, including sausages, Irish bacon, breakfast potatoes, smoked salmon (with all the trimmings), warm scones and croissants, buttered toast, and cheese omelets. Audrey and Sylvie then gave Pepper some carrots and apples for his own Irish breakfast.

Everyone then headed out for a day trip. Our family, along with my Mom and the Kathys (Guis and Galioto) drove out towards the west coast and stopped first at the Burren Smokehouse, where we learned how to smoke salmon (cold and hot) and did some sampling. Then we drove to the Burren, which is a large area of overwhelming volcanic rock formations, with old stonehenge-like graves and circular forts built out of rocks. We stopped and toured the Ailwee caves, which run about a mile into one of the Burren mountains (hills really, but big ones). Audrey and Sylvie were remarkably brave, even when the guide turned out all the lights and we found out what dark really means. Kathy Guis was pretty scared, though. The picture above is from just outside the cave entrance.

At night my Mom made burritos for the whole crowd, and we had a coach house party. Since we apparently can't take liquids back with us, we are trying hard to finish my precious 40-year old port that my sister-in-law Heather brought for me, and the brandy soaked cherries kate brought from France.

Still, try as I may, I cannot get a hangover in Ireland. I feel grand today - we just finished taking our Christmas card photos with the girls in their new princess dresses.

And we found the camera cord for the computer! Now I can upload more pictures to the website. It takes a while but I should have them all up today.