Another adventure... international this time, but without Jasper.

Soon, I'll be heading to the airport to fly to Ireland! I'm super excited, but crazy anxious. I don't fly well...and I don't leave Jasper easily. It has been almost a year in the making, and since December that plans have actually been formulating. As I said, I don't leave Jasper easily, nor do I leave him with just anyone. So, my sister volunteered herself and her eldest to take care of Jasper. I'm nervous, but grateful. 

The vacation time is 16 days, but 3ish days are spent traveling to and from Ireland. We fly into Dublin, arriving about 8am after leaving Denver about 11am the previous day. It's a long day of travel with a red eye flight to complete the journey. I hope my husband survives it. 

The first day is packed with walking Dublin trying to hit the Dublin Castle, St Patrick's Cathedral, Guinness Storehouse, Christ Church, St James Church, The Whiskey Museum, Temple Bar area, and so much more. Then, we spend 4 days backpacking Inn to Inn along the Wicklow Way, Ireland's oldest long trail (I'll be posting those adventures on my backpacking blog..."Kasey Takes a Hike" or backpackermadness.blogspot.com). We return to Dublin for a night before taking a train to Killarney with my friend & goddaughter. Killarney will then be the hub for the next 3 days, where we will hopefully make it out to Cork & the Blarney Castle/stone, tour the ring of Kerry, horseback ride, visit Killarney National Park, and possibly hike the pilgrimage route up Mt Brandon on the Dingle Peninsula. After being tourists, we will be dropped off in Tralee by my friend and goddaughter, where we will start the Kerry Camino. The Kerry Camino is a portion of The Dingle Way. They have a set of passport stamps along the way that a person collects. Once they have completed the route from Tralee to Dingle & gotten all their stamps (8 total, I think), they receive a certificate of completion. I love completion certificates of trails I have backpacked, so of course I had to do this adventure. From Dingle, we make our way to the Kerry airport, where we rent a car. We then drive the Cliffs of Moher to Galway, where we have an extra day to checkout Connemara National Park before returning to Dublin for the night before departure home. 

There is so much to see & do during the next few days/weeks. I'm excited, overwhelmed, and hopeful all goes well. The weather looks like rain often, but maybe my hiking patch of sunshine will be with us on the backpacking portions as well as the horseback riding. We will see. Stay tuned for photos and stories of our adventures in Ireland.