Fifty Shades of Green:Ireland

The last thing we expected when we arrived in Dublin was to feel like we were in South Bend.  We got to Dublin the day of the Notre Dame/Navy football game that was being played there.  That became painfully evident when we got to the airport and were waiting for the van to take us to the rental car office and the van unloaded a handful of people wearing Notre Dame hats and sweatshirts and jackets.  The driver of the rental car van informed us that an estimated 35,000 Americans were in Dublin for the game.  I’m guessing about 34,500 or more were for Notre Dame.  Ugh.

I have an unnatural dislike for Notre Dame football whose origin is difficult to precisely pinpoint.  I was raised Lutheran and Lutherans have an ugly and unfortunate history with Catholics that goes back about 5 centuries.  Something about the Reformation and all that.  Then, the girl I dated in college who crushed my heart was Catholic.  Then, for some unexplained reason, I married a Catholic, (remember an earlier blog post about a woman we called Mulligan?) which ended in divorce a few years later, something the Catholic church didn’t like at all.  That impacted my second marriage to a woman who also was a Catholic.  She claims I led her away from that religion, while I prefer to say I just pointed out a few inconsistencies I came across from time to time.

But the true genesis of my disdain for the Fighting Irish came in the late 70s.  My family had just moved from Lexington Kentucky, back to Cincinnati.  Being an Ohio State fan in Lexington was a lonely existence, trying to live a Scarlet and Gray lifestyle in the land of the Big Blue.  But I understood that, since UK was a huge presence in Lexington.   Makes sense.  Moving to Cincinnati, OHIO, I expected a decent amount of Ohio State football coverage.  What drove me crazy was the amount of coverage devoted by TV stations and especially the newspaper to Notre Dame football. 

It only got worse when the football coach at the wildly successful Moeller High School football program, Gerry Faust, was hired to take over at Notre Dame.  The Cincinnati media breathlessly covered his every move in South Bend.  He turned out to be as qualified to be the coach at Notre Dame as David Shula was to coach the Bengals.  But I really didn’t mind it as much, because Notre Dame was terrible during the Faustian era, much to my delight.  Then, they had to go hire Lou Holtz, who restored the echoes, blah blah blah blah, won a national title and just became really annoying to me. And who is now one of the worst football analysts on TV.

That level of annoyance has remained with me for the two ensuing decades so it was with a great deal of dismay that I saw all those Irish fans in, of all places, Ireland.  It was so prevalent, that walking around the streets of Dublin and even the city of Cork a few hundred kilometers away felt like being at the St. Gerties’ festival in Madeira each June.  Okay, I get it--you like Notre Dame.  Great.  Do you really have to wear a ND hat, a ND jacket over a ND sweatshirt while walking around in ND sneakers?  As I said earlier, ugh.  

The proliferation of Notre Dame fanatics continued, somewhat surprisingly at our first stop in Ireland, Cork.  We drove the few hundred kilometers to Cork the day of our arrival in Dublin, getting into Cork in the early evening hours.  The reason we chose Cork as a destination was pretty simple:  Costigan’s Pub was located there.

My wife, Annie, the keeper spouse, is Irish and her middle name is Costigan.  It's also the middle name we gave to our son Ben.  That’s the last name of some of her ancestors.  When I was doing research on where to go in Ireland, I did a search on Costigan + Ireland and Costigan’s Pub in Cork came up.  Well, we just HAD to go there, so Cork became our first stop in Ireland.

Cork is in southern Ireland, and is known as the food capital of Ireland.  We had some good meals there and enjoyed exploring the city.  It just so happened that the apartment we booked was just a block or so away from Costigan’s.  Annie and I checked it out one evening there, getting to know some of the locals who were very interested in our adventure, the details of which we were happy to share over a Guinness or Kilkenny or two. 

Cork is also fairly close to the Blarney Castle, one of Ireland’s most famous landmarks.  It was about a 20-minute drive from our apartment on the west side of Cork, and we had a beautiful day to enjoy the Castle, even if the line to get in was populated by many people wearing Notre Dame gear. 

Visitors to the Castle work their way through various hallways and rooms inside, and it’s a fascinating look back in time.  The culmination of course, is kissing the Blarney Stone, which is supposed to give the smoocher the gift of conversation.  It also occurred to me that kissing the stone that so many others had kissed might give the smoocher something else.  Something that an ointment or antibiotic might need to clear up, so I just strolled on by after both Ben and Annie went through the somewhat uncomfortable process that Blarney Stone kissers have to go through. 

To kiss the Stone, you have to lay down on your back, then lean down a foot or so to get your lips on the stone.  There is a worker who keeps traffic moving through very quickly, and then someone who takes pictures that you can buy in the gift shop afterwards.  Most of the photos come out somewhat awkwardly, with shots of peoples bellies or arms as they get into and then out of kissing position. 

The Castle is situated on some very scenic grounds and there are pathways through some well-manicured gardens.  It gave us an opportunity to get away from the huddles of people wearing Notre Dame stuff. 

We saw even more Notre Dame gear at our next stop, in the village of Dingle on the Dingle Peninsula on Ireland's western coast.  In searching out advice on where to go and what to see in Ireland, several people had mentioned the Ring of Kerry.  That’s a scenic drive along the western coast of Ireland in County Kerry.  Unfortunately, the day we headed to Dingle by way of the Ring of Kerry, it was rainy and drizzly, so visibility was very bad.  That takes a lot of the luster out of a “scenic drive” so we packed it in a bit early and headed to the house we had booked near Dingle. 

The house was about 5 kilometers north of Dingle, situated in some beautiful rolling hills.  It was surrounded by  farmland, and we had several sheep as neighbors.  I had a great time going outside the house, and shouting across the fence at the sheep on a regular basis, “Hey, Sheep!  It’s Bill!!”  That would prompt a great reaction from the sheep as every time I did that, the sheep would jerk their heads around in unison and look at me with their ears cocked. 

The sheep and I developed something of a relationship, which was enhanced, I think, when I took the laptop outside and fired up iTunes.  The song I had chosen was by one of our favorite bands-Cake, who had a popular tune in the mid-90s called Sheep Go To Heaven, Goats Go To Hell.  After getting through the chorus a couple of times, I was confident the sheep felt good about their prospects about the afterlife while being able to mock any goats they might encounter in the future. 

One reason I played Sheep Go To Heaven, Goats Go To Hell for my herd of friends was as a sort of “make good” (radio term when a commercial is missed on the air) for what had happened the previous night.  I love to grill out and have only been able to do it once our twice on the entire trip.  The house outside Dingle had great outdoor space and the store in town had one of those one-time-use only charcoal grills that cost about 5 euros, or roughly  $6.50.  I was willing to spend that to have the chance to play with fire while I cook.  One of my favorite things to grill out is lamb chops and the store in Dingle had some tasty-looking ones, so we bought those and headed back to the house.  It wasn’t until I lit the grill, and went back into the kitchen and unwrapped the chops and started to season them that I realized the uncomfortable juxtaposition that was about to happen.

Sure enough, my newly-friended herd was eyeing me suspiciously as I cooked the chops.  Fortunately the weather was a too chilly and windy to eat outside with the herd just a few feet away.  The chops were great, just hoped we weren’t having anyone the sheep knew. 

The house we had in Dingle became one of our favorites of the entire trip.  It had three bedrooms on the first floor, along with a large living room and a big kitchen.  There were also two bedrooms on the second floor, each with their own bathroom, so the upstairs became the kids wing, which they really enjoyed, as did Annie and I.

The nightly rate for the house, which was already very affordable, became even more so when the owner offered to let us stay two extra nights for free, since it wasn’t booked.  We quickly accepted that and took advantage of the time to explore the Dingle Peninsula.

I never pictured Ireland having dramatic landscapes, but I was pleasantly surprised as we took a drive on a gorgeous sunny day.  After only about 25 minutes in the car driving along some gently winding roads, we came to the northern coast of the peninsula.  The panorama that unfolded in front of us was stunning!

The scenery was magical, and the drive around the peninsula was very enjoyable.  There were spots, like ones we encountered in Scotland where there was only room for one vehicle at a time.  Unlike the narrow roads we drove on in the Scottish Highlands where drivers would yield based on who was closest to a passing bay, the encounters in Ireland seemed to be decided based on size.  That led to more than one instance of giving way to a busload of tourists.

Being in one place for five nights gave us time to do some time-consuming things that we weren’t able to do when getting in the car and driving to our next destination.  For Annie and Ben, that meant going fishing.

The two of them have a history of fishing in Canada on our vacations there, and they really enjoyed the two-hour excursion they went on. My Irish wife will take over from here:

What a joy it was to spend the day in Dingle Bay with my favorite angling buddy, Ben. We were fortunate to be accompanied by a great couple from Canada, Karen and Scott. They were rendezvousing in Ireland while Scott was completing a tour in Afghanistan.  It was a blustery yet fairly sunny day and the swells were running 6-8 feet so it made for a challenging balancing act while we pursued the pollock deep in the sea. 

We have only fished for bass before so going after the pollock was a completely unique experience. The water was about 80-100 feet deep and you drop your line to the bottom and slowly work it up.  Once you get a bite and reel them in, since they are so deep, the change in pressure takes all of the fight right out of them. Although they are large, unlike with feisty bass, there is no netting required boat side...you can just lift them in.  This little guy Ben brought up had his eyeballs pop out due to the pressure change...poor little buddy.

We ended up with about 8 large pollock which we were allowed to keep.  We chose to have the Captain clean two of them for the Canadians and the Bangert's and we took them to a local pub where they cooked them up for us for a mere 10 Euro a plate.  Not quite a bargain but who could resist!!  We hope the Captain had himself a good dinner that night and perhaps made a few extra dollars at the local market.

Fishing with Ben, in the country where our Costigan relatives once roamed, was an experience of a lifetime that we will forever treasure.  I don't think the pollock will feel the same way. ~ Annie.

While Annie and Ben were doing their version of Deadliest Catch, Marley and I had a very nice lunch and then took a drive to scout out a horseback riding place we had seen cruising around the peninsula.  When we got there and met the woman who led the riding expeditions, we noticed hooks on the wall with the names of the horses right above them.  Two of the names that stood out to us were Marley and Annie and their hooks were right next to each other!  That was definitely an omen, so we booked a session for Annie and Marley hopefully on Annie and Marley the following day.

Annie takes control of the keyboard again:  It was Marley's first time horse back riding and what a better way to do it than in Ireland, on the Dingle Peninsula on a horse named, Marley, with her Main-Momma!  It was an overcast and windy day which is pretty typical of Ireland.  We had decided to pick the tour that took you along the beach while surrounded by the hillsides.  Marley, the horse, needed a bit of direction and was led by our tour leader on a lead.  This method of control may come in handy with our daughter, Marley, someday. Duly noted.

 

It was a magical adventure surrounded by the greenery of her majesty, Ireland.  And Bill will be glad to know we didn't see one Notre Dame fan in sight.

With the girls off riding horses, Ben and I played a quick 18 holes of golf at a pitch and putt course.  I thought when we had driven by it that there were only 9 holes, but it turns out that there were twice that many and about four of those ran down to the water.  We got some great views across the bay of Dingle and had a great time.  I was glad to see Ben hit some really good shots, especially considering he hadn’t swung a golf club in about a year.  Plus, one of my major goals heading into 2013 and our life back home was to have Ben and I play a lot of golf together.  One of my dreams is to have Ben and I become golfing buddies and have us take golfing trips together.  Our outing at the Dingle Pitch-n-Putt may have been a small step in that direction.

The person I love playing golf with more than any other is my wife, Annie.  We had a great time playing together in Scotland, and we both really wanted to play golf together in Ireland.  Ireland is home to many great, famous courses, but none of those really fit into our travel schedule.  Fortunately, Dingle Peninsula is home to a golf course that was only about a 20 minute drive from the house we were renting. 

The day we picked to play Dingle Golf Club couldn’t have been better from a weather perspective.  There were just a few clouds dotting the blue skies as we teed off in the late afternoon to take advantage of reduced rates that kicked in after 4pm.  The guy working in the pro shop kindly only charged us for one set of rental clubs and off we went at about one-fifth of the cost of what we would have spent had we gone to one of the big-name courses we were thinking of.

Even though Dingle Golf Club was not of the caliber of Royal Dornoch, Annie and I both said we enjoyed it more.  A big part of it was it just the two of us.  No distractions from other players and we could hit second shots if we didn’t like the shot we had just hit.  It was great fun and the course was very enjoyable, with some great views and memorable holes.

Just as in Scotland, one of our favorite things about Ireland was the people.  Everywhere we went, people were very friendly.  Every single taxi driver was engaging and talkative, and when the topic of our trip came up, they all had a great deal of interest in the details. 

One of our favorite people in Ireland was the server we found at a restaurant in Dublin.  It was the date of the hurling finals which were being held in Dublin between Galway and Kilkenny.  We could feel the excitement as we walked from our apartment near the Guinness Brewery and grabbed a cab to the Temple Bar district.

We did some research at our apartment, finding out that hurling is an ancient Gaelic sport that dates back centuries.  It’s played on a field that looks to be about the size of a football field, with players using long sticks that look like a bit like ones used in field hockey.  It’s a very entertaining and physical game, with plenty of action.  

We found a great spot in the second floor of a restaurant with seating areas that provided a comfortable and cozy spot to watch the championship.  Our server was great, a guy in his late 20s who was very friendly but in a gruff sort of way, especially with the kids.  He got a big kick out of giving them a hard time in a good- natured manner.

He gave us some background on the rules as well as the two teams involved in the championship.  Kilkenny was a regular in the championship, having won a few titles, while Galway was the underdog.  The crowd got excited when Galway took the lead into halftime.  But the momentum shifted, and Kilkenny rallied to surge ahead in the second half making it look like they were going to win it all once again. 

However, Galway didn’t give up and got a dramatic score in the closing seconds to tie the game.  The announcers were saying how this was the first tie in the title game since 1959.  We were all excited about the prospect of the championship being decided in overtime or a shootout or a dance-off Riverdance style or something.  But then we heard the announcers talking about a replay.  A what?   Replay?  What’s that? 

Turns out instead of settling the matter right then and there, they get the two teams together again in three weeks and play the game over.  A re-play.   That was a serious letdown, but it’s just the way they do it. And that has been one of the bigger lessons of the trip.  

The world is a massive place, and as Americans, it's easy to fall into the line of thinking that it revolves around the United States.  We discovered early on that most people in other countries don't really care about what's going on in the U.S. nearly as much as we might think they do.  Every nation and their people are very unique, and very proud of their homeland.  And the Irish have much of which to be proud.

Scotland

The first real experience Annie and I had with Scottish people came in of all places, the Canary Islands.  In 1997, to celebrate Annie getting her MBA at Xavier, we took a trip to the islands that belong to Spain but are closer to Morocco.  (Good deal for me I must admit, she studies her butt off for 18 months, I get a nice trip!  I'm boss that way.)  We were there in May, and the Memorial Golf Tournament outside Columbus was going on at that time.  I was hoping to catch some of the action and a Scottish pub ran an ad in a local paper saying they had Sky Sports-PGA golf.

We made our way to the pub and inquired about the golf coverage and the woman working there had no idea what I was talking about.  Annie and I were the only people in the place in the early evening hours, so she patiently tried to find the PGA golf coverage on TV, but came up empty.  Slowly, but steadily the pace began to fill with Scots and before long, we were playing card games and singing songs, including for some reason, the theme to the Monkees.  When the time came for us to leave, the Scots said farewell to "Bill and Annie, our American friends!"  Some of them had even scribbled their home addresses on pieces of paper and offered to put us up in their places if we ever made it to Scotland.  It was a stunning displaying of friendliness and one we remembered for a long, long time.

Those memories stayed with us as we planned our visit to Scotland after our month-long stay in Garches, just outside Paris.  It was good to get back into our on-the-move-groove again after being settled in the townhouse in Garches for 30 days.  That was exactly double the longest time we had stayed anywhere previously on the trip.  Our first stop in Scotland was Edinburgh.

The friendliness that we remembered from our time with the Scots in the Canary Islands continued seamlessly when we arrived in Edinburgh and checked into the apartment we had booked.  The owner of the flat we booked, Alan, could not have been nicer.  He gave us some suggestions for places to eat and spots to get the most out of the Fringe Fest.

In another instance of right place/right time timing on our trip, Fringe Fest happened to be going on when we arrived in Edinburgh.  It's a major event that lasts for almost the entire month of August, and features performers of all types, some doing free shows on the street, while others perform for anywhere from 7 to 20 pounds typically at a wide variety of venues around Edinburgh.

With the weather being good our first day there, we decided to check out some of the street performers.  The first one was a woman dressed in a gaudy red outfit who had enlisted the assistance of a "volunteer" from the audience, (he didn't seem to be very enthusiastic about his duties) to help her get on a ladder and juggle some flaming torches.

As we learned over the next few days, this was a pretty common theme among the performers at this particular spot in Edinburgh.  The street performers would attempt to get upright on a ladder or step stool or in one case a unicycle, engage the audience by enlisting some of its members as assistants and then try to juggle torches or knives or even a chain saw.

We were very entertained and impressed by all of the performers we watched.  They were very funny and great at getting the crowd involved, even if it took stripping down to their underwear.

The streets were filled with people everywhere you looked, with a great vibe buzzing in each and every block.

Our most enjoyable time at Fringe Fest came when we finally took the plunge and bought tickets for an indoor performance.  Lights, Camera, Improvise! is a troupe made up of a half-dozen performers and they focus on movies.  The director comes out, chats up the crowd and with input from the audience, comes up with the premise for a movie.

The performers were hilarious, and Marley and Ben enjoyed it as much as we did, if not more.  We were very glad we checked them out.

Checking out Fringe Fest was one of the many suggestions we got from people who had been to Edinburgh when we put out the call on Facebook about what to do in this great Scottish city.  Another frequent recommendation was to go to the Military Tattoo.

I had never heard of such a thing, but it turns out the displays of military marching bands are held in cities all around the world.  Arguably the most famous is the one held in Edinburgh.  It dates back to 1950 and is staged at a stadium built next to the Castle.

We bought our tickets online while we were staying in Paris and hoped the unpredictable and ever-changing Scottish weather would be good the night we went.

The weather had been a bit dodgy from time to time during our stay in Edinburgh, in other words a typical Scottish summer.  Fortunately, despite some ominous looking clouds earlier in the day, the rain stayed away as we were wowed by the performance.

Marching bands from all across the globe, including the United States,  performed during the concert.  The best part was when the floor of the stadium was filled with bagpipers, who filled the air with a dramatic and emotional sound.

After a few days in Edinburgh, we were ready to hit the road and head north to explore the Highlands.  Our destination was Dornoch, a village on the northeastern coast of Scotland that is home to Royal Dornoch Golf Club, which was the main reason we were heading there.  More on that in a bit.

Renting a car in Scotland meant driving on the left side of the road, something I had done in New Zealand and Australia so I was fairly familiar with the process.   As I maneuvered the car from the rental car parking garage out onto the streets of Edinburgh, I realized I was familiar with driving on the left side of the road but I was not familiar with shifting with my left hand.  It's not the position of the car on the road that makes driving a stick-shift challenging, it's having to change gears with your left hand. 

To get out of Edinburgh heading to the north, we had to drive right through the heart of town.  Due in part to my unfamiliarity with using a stick-shift with my left hand, I managed to stall out our Skoda sedan on Waverly Street, which is in the heart of the tourist district, right by the train station.  After a few menacing honks from the horn of the taxi on my rear bumper, I managed to get the car fired back up again and safely guided us out of town.

We were not heading straight to Dornoch, which was about 5 hours to the north.  Instead, we took a slight detour to the north and west to stop at the William Wallace Monument.  It's in the village of Stirling, and focuses on the famous exploits of William Wallace.

This stop was another one that qualified as personal for Annie. She's a descendant of Wallace, who was a Scottish knight and landowner who led the fight in the wars of Scottish independence against the British.  The movie Braveheart was loosely based on his life. 

The William Wallace Monument looks out over the town of Stirling, one of the main focal points of a key battle against the Brits.  The monument has several displays about the life and times of William Wallace, including (spoiler alert!) his execution.  Executions were pretty popular back in the day.  One of the main squares in Edinburgh was a popular spot for executions, which drew big crowds.  Good thing the internet came along and gave people things to do so we stopped killing each other.  Good job humanity!  Oh, and Al Gore, too!

Dornoch was about three hours away, so we got back in our Skoda and enjoyed the ride through the Scottish countryside to the quaint seaside town.  Just north of Dornoch is the Dunrobin Castle.  It was the not so modest home for the Sutherland clan, dating back to the 1300s.

It towers impressively over large gardens that sprawl out to the sea.

Most afternoons, including the one we choose to visit Dunrobin, a falconry display is put on.  The falcon handler was great, running several birds through a variety of flights, typically flying the birds right over the heads of the crowd that had gathered to watch.

Toward the end of the performance, the falconer designated Ben as his young volunteer for the day.  He had an owl land on Ben's head, bringing a huge smile to Ben's face.

He also gave Ben a chance to feed the owl, wearing the proper protective glove of course.

It was great to have Ben be the co-star of the show, and a bonus not to have his face clawed off.

Our main reason for visiting Dornoch was the golf course there.  It's over 100 years old and was laid out by Old Tom Morris, the first great golf champion.  It's better known for being the training ground for Donald Ross.  He's a native of Scotland who served his apprenticeship as a golf-course architect at Royal Dornoch before moving to the United States in 1899.   Ross became the head pro at Pinehurst and wound up designing several courses there, including the famed Pinehurst #2.

I became familiar with his work when I lived in the Carolinas and loved his natural use of the land he was working with.  This came at a time in the late 80s when people like Jack Nicklaus designed courses that had huge contrived mounds and required a lot of forced-carry shots.  Ross designs are about subtlety which I really grew to appreciate and as I learned more about him, I dreamed of someday going to Dornoch to see where his inspiration came from.  Sometimes dreams come true.

Tee times online for Royal Dornoch were hard to come by, but we managed to get one at three o'clock on a Sunday afternoon.  The weather during our time thus far in Scotland had been a bit dicey, but we started our round under brilliant blue skies and got paired up with a guy from just north of London and his friend from Sydney, Australia. 

We also enjoyed the services of the first caddy that Annie has ever had, other than me of course.  Harry showed up when we were half-way through the first hole, and was an instant help.  He told us over the course of our round that he had played the course for 50 years and had been a member there for 20 some years, and a caddy for about ten.  On a course such as Royal Dornoch, you need all the local knowledge you can get, and he was our own Google machine.

At first he focused on just helping Annie, but as the holes went by, he would give us all advice.  He was a HUGE help as we tried to navigate the mysteries of Royal Dornoch.

The golf course itself was the kind I just love.  It looks like it just oozed out of the sand dunes and took shape over the centuries.  It's the most natural-looking course I've ever played, and it's certainly the most beautiful.

It's also a unique course among links courses in that it has elevation changes.  Most links courses are very flat, but Dornoch is situated on a ridge that overlooks the ocean that has several holes running along it.  The setting provides gorgeous views of the ocean and the holes that run along it.

Royal Dornoch certainly lived up to very high expectations.  I was in heaven strolling the fairways and admiring the bunkering and picturing Donald Ross courses that I had played and seeing the influence that RD had on him.  It was truly magical, even if I wasn't playing that well.

From the very start of the trip, I had been carrying with me a personalized Titleist golf ball.  Starting in Fiji, then in New Zealand and Australia and again in Singapore and then in Spain, I had managed to keep the ball with BANGERT printed in blue letters from finding a watery grave or getting lost in dense undergrowth.  The original plan was for me to try to take the ball all the way around the world and bring it back home with me.  But as we got close to the end of the round, I told Annie I had a change of plans.  I wanted to leave a piece of me there at Royal Dornoch.

So, as we walked off the 18th green in the fading daylight, (the round took over 5 hours!), I noticed some deep rough and decided that looked like a place where a golf ball could remain untouched for quite some time.  I turned and gave the ball my best Jay Bruce throw and watched it sail into the tall grass.  Someday, someone will find it and wonder what BANGERT is or signifies.

We exchanged pleasantries with our playing partners, knowing (thankfully) that we would never see them again. (The guy from Australia was an annoyingly slow player who wasn't good enough to take as much time lining up his shots as he did.)  Our parting with Harry included some genuine heartfelt feelings, we really enjoyed having him as a caddy.  He made a wonderful golf experience even better for Annie and me.

Dornoch is perfectly situated for exploration of the Scottish Highlands.  And that's what we did after our time there.

Our goal was to get to the northwestern coast of Scotland, and have lunch in the town of Lochinver.  The drive there was fascinating.  The landscape was much hillier than I imagined and was very barren.  It was a reminder of just how far north we were.

Lochinver was the farthest north any of us had ever been.  The roads getting there were basically one-and-a half lane roads that would have frequent spots to pull off to the side to let cars coming the other way pass by.  That set-up led to the occasional situation where two cars would be heading into a one-lane stretch with no passing bays between them.  One of the cars would stop, put it in reverse and back up to the nearest passing bay, hoping no one was coming up quickly behind them.  Surprisingly enough, the system worked well.

Lochinver proved to be worth the effort it took to get there.  It's a quaint little village on the banks of Loch Inver with a few restaurants along the waterfront.

There was also a playground that the kids enjoyed checking out, it's always great to see them get off their devices (laptops, iPads) and just be children for a while.  The drive out of Lochinver continued to expose us to some beautiful landscape as well as the occasional rainbow.

The frequency with which we saw rainbows triggered a family concept based on the Discovery Channel show, Storm Chasers.  That's where teams of meteorologists chase down tornadoes each spring in a show that's very interesting.  We decided that we were Rainbow Chasers, and I was the head-strong emotionally driven leader of the team named Beau Hunter.  It was fun to drive along, pretending to be the Rainbow Chasers.

Marley recorded some videos of our team in action and we had a great time as a family chasing rainbows.  It was a pursuit that would continue into our time in Ireland.

Our final stop in Scotland was just outside of Glasgow.  The best part of our stay there was that the apartment we found, which had three bedrooms so the kids didn't have to share a room, was that it was a short walk to the train station at Bishopton.  One of my favorite parts of the trip has been traveling by train whether it's an overnight train from Hanoi to Sa Pa in Vietnam, or traveling through Italy or Spain on the rails or just taking the local tram system like we did in Melbourne Australia.

The train into Glasgow was one of our favorites of the trip, in part because the main train station in town was beautiful.

It was clean and busy and filled with people going to a wide variety of destinations and really everything we were looking for when we decided to take this trip.

Glasgow is, like many European cities, very walkable.  There is a pedestrian walkway through the heart of the central city area, with shops and restaurants and cafes.

It's also the home to Charles Mackintosh, an influential designer in the Arts and Crafts movement of the early 20th century. We really like his style and it was great to see elements of his influence in several parts of town.

After ten days in Scotland, we were happy to find that our initial experience with Scottish people 15 years earlier was a true indication of what we would encounter in 2012.  They were definitely the most friendly people we met during our nearly 9 months on the road.  Now it was time to compare the Scots and their land with the people and places in our next destination:  Ireland.