Chris: Finally got back to Canmore late last night. Had an interesting day/night in Glasgow, Scotland on the way back. I start teaching in Morley tomorrow so I thought I'd take today to finish the update on our holiday to southwestern Ireland.

Kelly: I'm taking over this post as Chris is clearly a very slow blogger ('today' was 4 days ago)....Anywa, just finished my 3rd of 8 exams and need a little diversion from studying. Here's some highlights of our spring break trip through southwest Ireland.

We left Galway with two friends (Barry and Ian- 'The Hoff''), a jam packed car, no return date and no agenda other than heading to the Dingle Peninsula for a hike up Mt. Brandon. The weather was incredible and with that comes great sunsets. We had to race the sun going down to get to a beach in time to have a class of wine and watch the sun go down (it's a tough life we live). We found an amazing spot to camp, right on some sandy bluffs, and yes, made it just in time to see the beautiful red sky.

Sunset on the Dingle Peninsula with Mt. Brandon in the distance.

Lucky people!!

Lucky us!

Lucky Barry...nice place for breakfast!

Some locals on the road to the trailhead of Mt. Brandon

Check out the Irish polar bear!

Add a stone to the pile on your way by

The lads...all fed and ready to carry on

Nearing the summit

The summit of Mt. Brandon (952m).

Looking SW out to Slea Head.

View from the summit

After the Brandon hike we made our way to Dingle Town to spend the night.

A little friend to play with

Dingle Harbor

We found a nice beach to relax, read, swim and play some football. We could also catch glimpses of Fungi, the dolphin that lives in the opening to Dingle Bay.

Gaelic Football

A swim in Dingle Bay....very cold but seemed warmer than Galway

The Hoff was totally stressed out all day. We just couldn't get him to relax....

After Dingle we decided to head south to County Kerry to climb the 3 highest peaks in Ireland: Carrauntoohil (1039m), Beenkeragh (1010m) and Caher (1001m). A route called the 'Horseshoe' loop allows you to summit all three in one day.

We could see all 3 clearly on the drive from Dingle.

We stopped to pick up more camping supplies so as not to waste the extra 3 feet of space in the car! Barry and The Hoff were great sports dealing with the pack job (and Kelly, who had to sit with the garbage).

Another great campsite with a sunset view! (Across from Carrauntoohil)

(Carrauntoohil roughly pronounced Caren-tool)

Barry making an Irish specialty-hot whiskey ( It was just too bad that he accidentally bought nail polish remover instead of Whiskey)

The trail starts up through a farmers field

This lamb had just been born and was quite confused with the feeding frezy going on in his herd.

On the way up

The view behind us (our approach was from the lake in the disance)

A narrow ridge approach to the summit of Carrauntoohil (don't look down!).

If you look carefully you can see the cross on the summit.

On the ridge

On top of Ireland!!!!!!!!!!!

Apparently, there used to be windmill powered lights on that cross and a bicycle chained to it that some guy carried up just for laughs.

Summit views

After two big days of hiking and a day at the beach we parted ways with our friends and travelled further south to meet some Canadian friends on the southern tip of the west coast in a small town called Baltimore. It was a beautiful place and we spent a night in luxury at a small hotel built in the ruins of a 400 year old farm.

Us with our friend Dave (Canadian studying medicine in Cork, his mother-in-law, Francine, and little girl Ella). Daves wife Dominique was also with us.

The pe-electricity 'lighthouse' /beacon in Baltimore

Another day at the Beach

Kelly and Ella...we had so much fun with her!!

Splashing in the waves. Ella's intro to the ocean

We spent our last few days in Cork city at Dave and Dom's place. Cork is a beautiful city but we mostly enjoyed playing cards, great food, and the good company of our friends.

All in all, we were gone 10 days...had glorious weather the whole time and love this country more all the time.

And...back to the reality of studying for exams..... See ya soon!!