New school year 2010

The best thing about a long holiday is the kids are genuinely excited about going to school. So much so this morning that they were in the car before I had time to take proper photographs. And I knew they both weren't going to cooperate much with a camera in school so I had to just take it as they were. Iman is proud to be starting Year 3 and Jack has started Year 1. It was nice to see all the familiar faces in school and also plenty of new parents around (familiar faces too - this is Brunei afterall!) And after drop-off, it was just me and Ayden again... I have a few months left to enjoy his company in the mornings.

Post holiday blues

It never feels like it at the time but at the end of a holiday you always wonder where the time went and 7 weeks is a long time! We truly had a fabulous time in Ireland (and London). It's been great for Donncha to give an insight to where he grew up and also for me to introduce things from my younger years ~ Curly Wurleys, Calipos and Chipsticks just to name a few!

Still don't actually know how I managed but we packed everyting in. The Byrnes came down to say goodbye. We will miss Ruairi and Clodagh. A quick cup of tea at the airport with Grannie and Grandad *hugs* and we were off!

In London the kids were all excited to get to the hotel. We chose to stay out in Twickenham. Why sleep in a stadium? We were looking at hotels for ages and really did not fancy a cramped airport hotel room so we looked around the area and found this to be excellent value and we were not disappointed cos the rooms were really nice and getting out of the marshmallow at 4:30 the next morning was not easy.

And Twickenham high street itself was lovely with plenty of nice restaurants and we had a superb Indian ~ you just can't beat a British Indian!

Dingle Night Out

Apologies to those who by now are "Dingled" out. I promise this is the last set and believe me it is such a lovely place.

We had dinner at this little fish restaurant which has up on the front "only fresh fish, nothing frozen and no chips". And it's owned by a Frenchman so I guess you can't go wrong and we weren't disappointed!

To start we had mussels and oysters. I wanted to go all out with the oysters but Donncha wanted both. And how right was he as the mussels was as fresh as they come with a lovely flavor from fresh rosemary.

Straight from the tank

For mains I had the scallops which was superb. Doesn't look much but it was still one scallop too much for me!

And Donncha had the whole wild bass perfectly grilled. So simple but could we duplicate this at home ~ no!

Next we headed to the famed O'Flahertys for some Irish music. Dingle is a big centre for Irish music and most bars will host musicians which you will not find in other towns in the country. Initially it was just the man with the beard (a very talented man who played up to 5 instruments and could sing as well) and the lady with the flute and they were later joined by their mate on the guitar and the man on the violin was a customer who just joined in.

On our way home we noticed these big deep sea fishing trawlers unloading - they were all Spanish and more surprisingly unloading their catch straight onto waiting Spanish trucks to drive the catch back. And the trawlers didn't hang about much. They turned round straight away and said they would be at sea for another week up North. Not for the fainthearted!

Jack in action

When I showed Jack the pictures of himself his response was "...but Mama why didn't you take a video?!" So here it is...

Go Jack Go

I bought Jack and Ayden table tennis bats and balls today and after Ayden went to bed Jack figured out how he could play by himself. He was very proud and I just had to take and post the pictures as it reminded me of one of my favorite movies!

Cloghane

I think by now you must all know that the Dingle Peninsula is an oasis of untouched beaches and quaint villages and Cloghane is no exception. Our travel mates Ruairi and Clodagh have holidayed in the village in recent years so we were given a tour of the area.

From the Connor Pass

And "chilling" out by the pier.

Irish Summer Flowers

Not sure what these flowers are called but they are everywhere on the country roads.

Ballyferriter

Our last day in Dingle wasn't a particularly tropical one so we drove round the peninsula via Ballyferriter (a gealtacht village - gealic speaking) for lunch and further up from the village we stopped at this purple seaweed beach which was used in the filming of "Far and Away". The rocks around the beach were covered in mussells, limpets, slugs and periwinkles which all the kids loved. The mussels even made patterns like the 8 which Iman spotted.

We then drove on to this small cafe to absorb the view while the kids had another dose of the local Murphy's Icecream ~ simply divine.

They also got to know this friendly Kerry goat very well!

Coomenoole

Or Coum Dhíneol is probably the best beach we visited this holiday. Used in the fliming of "Ryan's Daughter", it is the closest beach to the Slea Head and has dramatic views! And though not a blue flag beach it was very busy on the day we went and the water very inviting even for me!!! It felt great to be in the Atlantic at last even though I couldn't feel my legs after a few seconds!