sorry for the long delay!

Hello all!

Well straight off I need to apologize to everyone, my thought before I left for this incredible trip of a lifetime, was that I would write in my blog every night. Yeah well after arriving and beginning our journey I quickly realized that wasn't going to happen. I mean it was a great thought and all but it just wasnt practical! Dan and I are up every morning at about 7 am we have our amazing Irish breakfast then we hit the road. Mind you we are not in any kind of a rush to see things but things pop up along the way that we end up wanting to see so the morning that may have started with just one or two things to see may end up with 5 or 6 things in the end! And honestly we expected that during this journey. We start trying to find a place to lay our heads for the night by about 3-4:00pm. Once we accomplish that it is find some food, have a pint or two and then we are both out for the count by about 8-9pm! I know we are showing our age here! lol. But it is amazing how tired you are at the end of the day. At alot of the sights we are visiting there is ALOT of walking involved! And for me personally that has been difficult but I have made it thru! But at the end of the day I am exhausted! So I am sorry I haven't done a great job of keeping up with my blog. Let me see if I can give you a condensed version of what we have done so far.

..........Gosh I don't even know where to start! I have spread Mom and Dad's Ashes in some beautiful places along our journey. The first place was in Glendalough. It is a beautiful national park area, I know in my heart they would have loved it there! I wish I could add photos here but with my Ipad I just cant, So if you have Facebook you can see all my photos from our trip there. We have also visited the Village of Cong which is where the movie "The Quiet Man" was filmed. WOW! what an AMAZING village. It is so incredible, there are no words to describe to you just how beautiful this place is. If I could I would live there. I truly didn't want to leave!! Of course we have visited most of the Castles that you think of when you think of Ireland, Trim, Bunratty, etc. We did Newgrange and Knowth, the Hills of Tara, Loughcrew Carins, Connemara. But alas no I didn't kiss the Blarney stone. Figure with my family history there is no need! LOL

However, I did visit a couple of places that were special to me personally. As anyone who knows me knows that I am into the paranormal and you also know that I am wiccan. So one of the places I wanted to visit that was off the beaten path (ok way way WAY off the beaten path!) was Biddy Early's Homestead. Biddy Early is the most famous "Witch" of Ireland. In all honesty all she was was a healer, she used herbs to heal, but because of the King and the way Christianity was taking over the country anyone who didn't follow their ways was thought to be a witch. But anyway, (don't get off course here Maureen!) parts of Biddy's cottage are still standing. It is just outside of the Village Feakle. And a few people still make the trek to find her cottage to pay their respect the the Great Biddy Early. It is said that if you go to Biddy's Place you need to leave her an offering or else you will be plauged with bad luck. usually its a coin or whiskey etc. So on the day that Dan and I went to visit we came with a coin and a small bottle of mead. It took us awhile to find the place. Had it not been for a kind older gentleman walking along the road we would have never found it! I think we passed it at least 6 times! But once we found it and made our way up to her cottage, it was a very moving moment for me. Once I stepped thru the threshold of her cottage I was overcome with a wave of emotion. I felt this great sadness yet at the same time I also felt a sense of pride. I think that is what Biddy must have felt. Sadness that she was misunderstood but pride in the fact that she was helping people. While Dan walked around the outside I took a moment to pay my respects to Biddy. I thanked her for all that she did and told her that I honored her for the woman that she was and that she was ahead of her time. I told her that I was leaving her a coin and a good taste of Mead for her to enjoy later. I placed the objects on the windowsill along with items others had left for Biddy. I again thanked her for allowing me the privilege to be in her home, A cool breeze blew around the inside of the cottage for a moment and rustled the few leaves that were on the wet muddy ground inside and then it blew past me and out the door. I took this as Biddy's fair well, I looked around one last time and I left. This was truly an experience that will live with me for the rest of my life.

The second place that ranks really high on my list is Leap Castle. Leap Castle is THE most haunted Castle in all of Ireland. It has been on many of TV shows such as "Most Haunted, "Ghost Hunters" and "Ghost Hunters International". I have read about it for years! And being into the paranormal as much as I am Leap Castle is at the top of the list of places you have to see! It wasn't until we were getting ready to head back to Dublin when I realized that we hadnt seen Leap Castle! And I thought "Oh No!! I am gonna leave Ireland and not have seen Leap Castle!" But Dan being the amazing and worlds greatest husband EVER that he is, said "Honey we still have time, see if you can figure out how to get into visit and we will go". So that set me on a mad scrabble to see about getting in to visit the Castle. Now some of you may know and some may not, But Leap Castle is privately owned and you need to contact the owner directly to inquire about visiting. The owner Sean Ryan is a musician and he travels the world playing so it is not easy to get access to the Castle especially in the off season. Which is when we are here. I searched the web trying to find the correct way to contact him. Holy cow there are so many different email addresses and Phone numbers ! But then I realized that the Book that I brought with me had a small snippet about Leap Castle in it and it gave his email and a phone number!!!! so I emailed him and asked if we could come for a visit, mind you this was a last minute request so I wasn't expecting him to be home or to even say yes, let alone that I would get a reply in a timely manner. So I sent an email that night, the next morning to my surprise I got a reply!!!! He said we were welcome to come and visit! I was over the moon excited! so Dan and I headed out that morning. As we got close to the village of Kinnitty we had to stop and ask for directions since we didn't know exactly where we were going and there are no signs. We stopped at Kinnitty Castle which is a privately owned hotel (posh to say the least! this Castle has been standing since 430 AD!!!!) We got directions but promptly got lost! Stopped at a local pub to ask directions. Dan decided he would wait in the car and he would send me in to get directions.....oh brilliant idea honey! I walked into this pub to inquire about directions and every old man in the place was like "Well hello lass" boy they were MORE then eager to help me out! LOL The younger guy behind the bar told them all to behave which got me laughing! they all started talking at once trying to tell me how to get to Leap Castle. I said "Wait I need you to write it down" of course that made them all look at me funny for a moment. You know that look of "Ahhh of course, because she is a woman" I just looked at them and say "Hey I use to be blonde so you have to write things out for me!" They all laughed and then asked me to come back for a drink after we visited the castle! LOL But of course they wanted to know why I was going there......"Its haunted ye know Lass.....Why do ye wanna go there?" I said "That is exactly why I want to go there!" Anyway, finally found Leap Castle. Met the owner Sean Ryan, he has to be the nicest man EVER! we must have sat in front of his fire for at least an hour just chatting before he told us to go have a look about. He handed us a flashlight for the bloody chapel since there is no light going up. And Dan and I were off to explore! Boy that place has quite a feel about it! on the way up to the Bloody chapel there is a room off to the left, which Sean later told me was the smoking room where they smoked the meat. That room was very oppressive. While in that room I had the definate feel that I was not alone. My chest became very heavy, I felt as if someone had their hand around my heart it was a scary feeling. Sean told me that I was not the first person to experience that in that room. Once in the bloody chapel there was a room off to the left corner that Dan and I both felt something in that room. And then there was the Obliet (not sure of spelling) that is where they would throw the prisoners. Obliet is a french word which means "To Forget" . Captures we thrown down there and just forgotten until they died. We didn't catch much on camera, just a few orbs. however while we were downstairs sitting in front of the fire chatting with Sean Dan and I both heard a females voice. She was talking although we couldn't make out what she was saying. And I was the only female in the house at the time. Neither one of us knew that the other had heard this until we were driving back to Kinnitty Castle where we were staying. We were talking about the things we had experienced at the Castle. I mentioned that while Sean was talking I had heard a females voice and Dan looked at me and said "Oh my god I heard it too! I was looking around to see where it was coming from!" So we have personal experiences but not much visual. Just a few orbs. Which for me, validate something as I know what was and wasn't there. Usually orbs dont mean anything to me as they can usually be explained, but I was there I know what I saw and what was there and what wasnt there.


Well, hope you all enjoyed what little I could update you all on. I will try (not going to promise mind you) and update one more time before we leave. But at the moment I am sitting in Kinnitty Castle in a beautiful grand bar and it has inspired me to write. But we have 6 days left (I think! lol) so maybe I can write again once we are in Dublin) Much love to all !!!!