Happy New Year!

Let me be the last to wish you a Happy New Year! We got back from our 8 days in Dingle very late on Monday, 8th January. In fact, it was nearly midnight when we pulled into our drive. It has taken this long to get clothes washed, groceries bought, and my photographs downloaded and tweaked.

I'll just give you a brief introduction to the Dingle Peninsula today and elaborate in days to come. I'll start off by saying this was a wonderful introduction to Ireland for us. The scenery was gorgeous, the people were very friendly, and the music was terrific and available every night of the week somewhere in Dingle. We had a delightful time with our friends Kay and Boris who did a great job of showing us around.

We had horrific winds here in Scotland and, thus, in Ireland too, on the day we flew over to Ireland. Once the plane took off we had a very rough ride up through the wind and clouds until we reached our cruising altitude. Then again, coming back down through the clouds we were buffeted, although not quite so much. The flight is only an hour long. It was almost 3 in the afternoon when we arrived (athough we'd left the house at 9 for the airport!) at Shannon Airport and it was raining. We had close to a 3-hour drive from Shannon to Dingle after picking up the hired car, about half of that in both rain and dark so we really saw very little of Ireland that day.

When we found John Benny Moriarty's pub in Dingle and walked in at about 7 pm, we found Boris and Kay waiting for us. We sat down and had a Guinness and compared travel stories. Fortunately, they had gotten in early and so had bought breakfast makings. After a while we went back to the car and took our things to the cottage which sat on a hill behind the pub. We had a twin room with a shower room across the hall. Kay and Boris had the back bedroom with an en suite shower room. Downstairs there was a half-bath, a kitchen and a large sitting/dining room with lots of windows.

Back at the pub, we had dinner and settled in to enjoy the music laid on for New Year's eve. We all felt, in the end, that it was the least traditional or special music of the week, but perhaps it was the perfect backdrop to all the noise a packed-in crowd can make on New Year's eve. In fact, we didn't even make it until midnight. For the first time in years, we were in bed and asleep before then. Boris and Kay had jet-lag as an excuse; we were just plain tired from all the travelling we had done all day.

The next morning it was still windy and a bit cold. We had on and off rain, but it was never totally sunny. It wasn't a day to do much sightseeing but we did drive out the peninsula. Our first stop was Slea (pronounced "Slay") Head. The photos above show our first view of the Atlantic Ocean at Slea Head and the slightly larger than life-size shrine installed in the rocks across from where the other photo was taken. We also saw the Gallarus Oratory, a small domed place of prayer that may date back to the 7th or 8th century. In fact, the Dingle Peninsula has thousands of ancient sites of interest.

After lunch, we walked around the town of Dingle, poking into shops, reading menus, and looking at notices of what music was on in the various pubs that night. The same group was on at John Benny's pub as had been on the night before so we decided to go to An Drochaid Beag (the small bridge) to hear Eifa Kennedy who played fiddle and flute accompanied by her sister Diedre on the clarsach (harp).

That's the travelog for today. More in days to come.

Poor Don has developed a very bad right knee. He's been having some discomfort in it for a few months now but nothing debilitating. As we were waiting in Shannon airport and again after we arrived back at Pestwick Airport his right leg was paining him and occasionally, giving out on him. This problem continued into Tuesday morning with a lot of discomfort, so he went to the medical centre. The doctor diagnosed it as floating pieces of cartilege. She referred him to an orthopedic/physiotherapy programme but, of course, there's a 4- to 6-week wait. He's taking Ibuprofen 4 times a day, wearing an elastic leg brace, and staying off his feet as much as possible. The worst aspect of this, of course, is that the closest he has been able to get to playing golf is that he's using a pitching wedge (that's a golf club to us neophytes) as a cane here in the house. I think it's time we got a proper walking stick (cane) as we both have had to resort to golf clubs recently!.

As for me, I have begun the South Beach Diet. Taking a totally positive view, I am not heaping negatives on myself for gaining so much weight. Instead, I say I have been following a successful weight-gain strategy until now and have now begun a successful weight-loss strategy. I survived the first day with no problems and expect things to continue in that direction.

Time for me to go make my lunch so I can get ready for my book group meeting this afternoon. It will be nice to do something besides laundry and grocery shopping.