Hello friends. I've been silent for a few days. That's because I have been on vacation. On Saturday, Jamie, Marco and I flew from Berlin to Dublin, Ireland for a week of driving across this beautiful country. In Dublin, we picked up Jamie's mother Sharon, and together we are trekking around this beautiful country. I cashed in some of my air miles and wanted to take the family someplace that they have never been--and some place that I love.
I first visited Ireland in 1995. I also visited Northern Ireland more recently. That first trip to Ireland was very special. I had an extremely powerful spiritual experience on that journey at the Cliffs of Moher. Maybe one day I'll tell the story here on the diary. Suffice to say, the Cliffs of Moher (on the West Coast of Ireland), is a special, spiritual place to me. It was great to get to show that to Jamie, Marco, and Sharon as they have heard so much about my famous Cliffs of Moher story.
Ireland has changed a lot since I was last here. Back in 1995, Ireland was pretty much a third world country. The runt of Europe--backwards and poor. All of that changed with the boom of the mid-90's, which led to the "Celtic Tiger" era of Ireland, when globalization arrived and the economy and real estate went through the roof. Then the banking crisis of 2008 hit, and much like Greece, Spain, and Italy---the country and it's infrastructure looks good, but go down deeper and you see that the nation is actually bankrupt and in severe trouble. More about that later here on the diary.
For now, it's enough to say that we are having a great, very relaxing time, and enjoying spending focused time as a family and with Grandma. We rented a car and are driving around much of the country visiting a lot of key regions. Our trip will end up back in Dublin where we picked up our car. I'll be writing more about the trip here on the diary and including photos. At the moment, we are in Dingle, Ireland where we just heard live Irish folk music a few minutes ago in a local Irish pub. We saw the Cliffs of Moher earlier today and head to drive around the Ring of Kerry tomorrow. More coming soon.