Hi everyone,

My daughter Beth and I took a two week trip to Ireland in September. We stayed in Dublin, then took a 9 day “Folk and Pub Tour”. We had a lively fun group of adults on our bus. There were 22 of us, all ages and our Irish driver was very knowledgeable about the history of Ireland and the places we visited. We covered quite a bit of territory starting out in Dublin, on to Kilkenny, Killarney, Blarney Castle and stone, Ring of Kerry, Cliffs of Moher, Clifden, Connemara, Westport, Galway, Valencia Island, Kilbeggan, cruised Killary Harbour and took a ferry ride across the River Shannon to name a few and lots of Pubs in between, ha,ha.

Took lots of pictures but am only going to bore you with a few. One of the pics is of me with a young man, Kevin McGillycuddy, a possible cousin. He and his wife Christina originally from NYC moved to Ireland from NYC by way of London about 10 years ago. They now live in Dublin, have 3 darling children and had us over for dinner. They are as nice as can be and we all got along famously. You will see the photo of John Wayne by the bridge from the movie”The Quiet Man”. I am sitting on the bridge wall where it was filmed. The Celtic stone cross you see in the fields is a monument in memory of those who died during the potato famine. The fairytale castle photo is actually a Monastery. Of course we saw the beautiful McGillycuddy Reeks mountain chain.

My ancestors are from the area between Killarney and Tralee in County Kerry. Just for fun had to get photos of a few Irish “name” signs. Matt Malloy of Pub fame was on vacation in the Mediterranean. We had a Guinness with his son. Some of you will relate to the names. Kevin is planning a McGillycuddy Clan Gathering in 2010 to take place in the Killarney, Killorglin, Ring of Kerry area.

Hope all is going well.

Erin Go Braugh,

Kathleen