Pre-Deployment Ireland Trip & Brian's Departure

Hi everyone! Brian and I finally got back from our Ireland trip a couple weeks ago and we have been pretty much been going non-stop since we returned. Brian is officially gone on deployment :( He left Tuesday, May 3^rd in the afternoon. It was sad to drop him off. I miss him already! I haven't heard from him yet but he had quite a long flight ahead of him. They stopped in Hawaii Tuesday evening to re-fuel and from there still had to go to Guam and stay over night and then they would make there way to the Philippines. I'm looking forward to hearing from him!

Even though it was sad to say goodbye we had an AWESOME trip to Ireland, London and Scotland! We flew into London and spent our first couple nights there! We were pretty tired and jet lagged when we first got there and caught ourselves going to bed early and waking up at like 4am. But we packed a lot of stuff in while we were there! We walked a ton and saw Buckingham Palace, Parliament and Big Ben, London Eye, Tower Bridge, the London Tower and we saw the Crown Jewels. We had a good time but did not enjoy the exchange rate between the dollar and the pound while we were there so we were happy to move onto Ireland.

We spent a whole 7 days in Ireland and this is where the adventure really began because we rented a car. We got a tiny, standard car and Brian drove us all throughout Ireland on the opposite side of the road. Our first day in Dublin was very INTERESTING because in Dublin they don't really believe in street signs so with no navigation system the city was impossible to get around in. It took us 2.5 hours to go 16 miles from the airport to our hotel. Other than that day though we got around great and Brian did awesome driving on the opposite side with a stick shift car! Dublin was fun and the people in Ireland are so friendly! We walked all over the city and explored and one of our favorite touristy things to do there was the Guinness Brewery Tour. That was really fun! We also saw live traditional Irish music every night and even got roped into doing some traditional Irish dancing one night which ended up being a blast.

From Dublin we then moved onto Kilkenny (a small town) and stayed at a really charming bed and breakfast. This was probably one of our favorite places! The city itself was so cute and it had a huge, beautiful castle in the city that we toured. We had a great time at night too at the pubs and saw some really good live music while we were there. The next day we headed to Blarney near Cork where we would kiss the Blarney Stone which was really fun and a lot different than you would expect! We stayed at a really nice little hotel in the country near the Blarney castle. From there we then went on to Limerick where we visited Bunratty Castle and Folk Park as well as the Cliffs of Moher out on the coast which were absolutely beautiful. The cliffs were probably the highlight of the trip (see pictures)! We then drove all the way from the west coast back to Dublin on the East Coast where we spent our last 2 nights before heading onto Scotland. We had to hit the Leprechaun Museum before leaving Ireland and we just enjoyed the city and Irish food before leaving.

Our last nights were spent in Edinburgh, Scotland. This is such a cool city and so old and full of history! There we were exhausted so we opted for the bus tour instead of doing the city by foot. We also visited a lost underground city which was built over a couple hundred years ago. We learned a lot about their history and how plague kind of ravaged the city a long time ago. Edinburgh is beautiful and split into old town and new town (although new town is older than the United States). It has a huge castle that sits in the middle of the city up on a large cliff so its very picturesque! The weather in Scotland was a bit cold so that slowed us down a bit. We had great sunny weather in London and Ireland and Edinburgh was scarf and warm jacket weather.

Overall we had a blast and we're so glad we had that time together before deployment! We came back and the following weekend were in our good friends' wedding out in Julian, California so we spent the weekend out in the country. I'm looking forward to hearing from Brian! And in the meantime this month I'm staying busy! I get to see my sister in Boulder in a week and the following weekend my dad and sister will be visiting me in San Diego. Then I will be spending memorial day weekend (and our first wedding anniversary) out in Boise with my mom and brother and sister! So I am staying busy!

I hope everyone is doing well! That's all for now but I will be updating the blog perhaps a little more regularly while Brian is away! I will update you guys on what he is up to when I hear from him! Miss you all!!