Yesterday, I fell in love with Northern Ireland, and today it got even better. Portrush is beautiful, stunning and wild. But it’s also quite touristy, which isn’t really my thing.  Today, we ventured beyond Portush, along the coast, and through the glens, to discover even more of beautiful Northern Ireland.

After exploring more of the gorgeous Portrush coast, we drove east along the cliffs. We first came upon Dunluce Castle, which started dissolving back into the ocean hundreds of years ago, as it stands right at the edge of the cliffs overlooking the sea. It looks so much a part of the landscape that at first, I didn’t see it as anything but a pile of rocks. I would move in tomorrow.

We drove from there along to the Giant’s Causeway, which we loved and the kids hated (too much walking, too much wind, too cold — at this point, I think just too much vacation). I thought the story of the giant who created it (wink, wink) would interest them, but it only kept B’s attention for about 3 minutes. Nevertheless, a really gorgeous place.

As we drove along the coast further east, we found our next house (it’s actually for sale, so I’m only partly kidding). I can’t come up with enough different ways to say beautiful, stunning, ocean, sea, cliffs. But all of it, together with the rolling farmland that extends right to the cliffs’ edge, come together to make something so lovely and wild that I never expected to see anything like it. I also never expected to be jealous of a cow, but many of them have the most beautiful seaside, clifftop views.

We continued along and drove through the glens, which were very beautiful in a different, mountain and valley kind of way — a lot like the Lake District in England, except all in shades of green and with a lot more trees.

It is all so beautiful. I feel so connected with the landscape. I am so sad to be leaving.

We drove up from Dublin today for our first of two days in Northern Ireland. Our first stop was Belfast, specifically the Falls Road, where my grandmother grew up. I’m not sure exactly where on the road she lived, but I wanted to go and check it out. I’m glad we went. It was interesting to see the strong politics there and how they’re demonstrated (flying Irish flags, the only place we’ve seen in Northern Ireland with Irish writing on the street signs) and it felt good to “visit” with my grandmother while here on this trip that makes me think of her so much.

And then we drove on to Portrush, on the Antrim Coast. When we came over the crest of the hill and saw the rocky costline and the wild sea, all I could say for several moments was, “Wow.” It is amazingly beautiful and rugged and wild. I have never fallen so instantly in love with a place. I would move here tomorrow and live here forever.

We checked into our hostel (our first hostel ever) and walked down to the point of land that sticks out into the Irish Sea. There’s a path and a small playground, and the wind is whipping and the ocean crashes all around. It’s like the edge of the world — but it’s green.

The boys played and ran around while the waves crashed and sent the sea spray up into the air and then down on to all of us as mist. Liam loved it — the wind tangled his hair and he just ran. B wanted to go swimming (um, no) and then hid in the stroller to get away from the wind, but then wanted ice cream.

I love it here. I’ve said that before about other places, but this place feels different. It isn’t idyllic or perfect. A lot of people wouldn’t like it at all. But it speaks to me. I find it beautiful and very centering. It’s not that I like it here more than the other places I’ve been and loved, but this satisfies something different in me. Those other places are wonderful, and I want to go back. But this feels like finding a place I’ve been looking for all along and never thought I’d find.

I am so happy to be here, and so excited to see what we discover tomorrow.

So, we’re in Dublin. We’ve been here over 24 hours, but we haven’t really done or seen very much Dublin-y stuff.

This morning, we were all set to head out to run a few errands and find a playground, ahead of a trip downtown. But, as Dan was getting his shoes on, Liam fell asleep. So, Dan took B to go and play while I curled up with Liam. Two hours later, they came back, and as we were preparing to go get lunch, we looked over and both kids were sleeping.

We finally all got out of the room just before 5, to go do some laundry and get a few groceries. (This is the exciting life I lead.)

Mostly, today was about resting and recovering. My back is feeling a bit better, and neither of our kids threw up today. That’s an improvement.

This evening, we finally got out to get dinner. All of the street signs are written in Irish, which presents an interesting challenge, and we accidentally found ourselves driving down a narrow street full of intoxicated Irish bar patrons who didn’t seem particularly interested in making way for our car. So that was a bit of an adventure.

Other than that though, today was one of those days (I have them often) that could have happened anywhere. Naps, laundry, grocery shopping and playgrounds are pretty universal. Today was just me being a mom, Dan being a dad, and the boys being kids — Ireland or not.

Yay!!!! We’re in Ireland!!! I have always wanted to be here and I’m so excited that we’re here.

But . . .

Thanks to some very poor planning on my part, we had an intense 11 hour day of travel. I’m usually really good at planning these kinds of things, but I messed up this time. We drove down from York to London (about 3 hours), flew to Belfast (just 1 hour in flight), and drove to Dublib (about 2 hours). Each piece was no big deal, but somehow I failed to consider that all of these things were going to happen on the same day, and that with the extra time needed at the airport, plus dropping off and then picking up a rental car, it would make for 11 hours between leaving our hotel this morning and arriving at our new one tonight. All I can say is that my kids are amazingly patient and willing to have put up with Mommy’s crazy schedule today.

On top of that, I threw my back out yesterday and Liam threw up again within an hour of our arrival here, so this is not my most favorite vacation day ever.

But tomorrow we will rest, and feel better, and enjoy Ireland. And hopefully we won’t have to get in the car at all.

Liam has Benjamin’s illness from last week — he woke us all up at 3:30 this morning to show us. My poor guys. Vacation is fun, but it’s hard to be travelling so much, and it’s even harder to be sick while you’re doing it.

Nothing bonds you as a family like waking up in the night to take care of each other, though. When your baby is sick and miserable, everything else suddenly seems unimportant. And B, who woke up while we were getting Liam cleaned up, reassured Liam with lots of good advice like, “You’ll feel better soon, Liam” and “It’s ok, we’ll get you all cleaned up” and then he offered Liam his own red sword to help him feel better. (He is the best big brother.)

Times like that, I realize a few things. First, however insecure and clueless I feel as a parent, I must be doing something right to have kids who talk to each other that way (I’m not taking credit — maybe they came pre-programmed that way — but at least I haven’t ruined them yet). Second, I am so grateful for my children’s health — this is a short, tiny blip on an otherwise intensely healthy period. And third, in the midst of vomiting children, sleeping on towels and doing very gross laundry in hotel room sinks, there is nowhere I would rather be than right there with my boys. I love being with my kids, caring for them, more than any other thing I can imagine doing.

By mid-afternoon, Liam was back to his chipper, hungry self. Hopefully we will all stay well for the last bit of our trip.

In the Harry Potter movies, pieces of lots of different places (castles, cathedrals, universities — plus a good bit of CGI) were used to depict Hogwarts Castle. So, there isn’t really a single place you can go to visit.

Today, though, we went to Alnwick Castle, which was used for a lot of the exterior shots in the first two movies. Honestly, we went mostly because I wanted to see “Hogwarts”, but we ended up having a fantastic time for entirely other reasons, too.

We arrived just in time for B and I to take part in the daily broomstick flying lesson (an homage to a part of the movie filmed there). It was silly, but really fun, and B and I enjoyed doing it together (Liam joined in for small portions). After that, we wandered around for a bit before coming to the knights and dragons section, specifically for little kids. (They also have some kind of tour not appropriate for little ones, so we skipped it.)

Benjin and Liam used the foam swords we purchased in the gift shop to slay a dragon. (We gave them the titles Brave Sir Benjin and Liam the Wise for their relative tendencies to charge in or hang back.) We had sword practice, got dressed in appropriate attire, made shields, played chess and galloped around on horseback (not a real horse — Daddy was being equine). The boys had a great time, and so did we. (I would call it a not-to-be-missed attraction for kids in northeastern England.)

By the time we headed to our hotel for the night, the boys were tired and happy.

(Another highlight from our day was the drive down from Edinburgh. We came down along the coast and got to see some spectacular views on our journey.)

We had another great day at a beautiful castle (and no ER visit this time!). Although, in retrospect, buying them swords and then telling them not to use them on each other may not have been the wisest plan ever.

I love Scotland. I wish we were staying longer. And I’m really enjoying Edinburgh — I wish we’d gotten more of a chance to see more of it, in particular.

My number one destination in Edinburgh was the castle, though, and we got to go today, which was a nice surprise — I had heard it wasn’t open on Sundays, but it is!

Edinburgh Castle sits at the top of a
huge (apparently volcanic — I learned lots on the tour) rock formation overlooking Edinburgh. It’s massive, gray and forbidding — very appropriate for a castle. We looked all around, had lunch, took a brief, informative and funny tour (well, B and I did, while Dan and Liam followed along) from our Scottish guide named Fergus, and saw the crown jewels of Scotland.

I had a great time. The views of Edinburgh were fantastic, and the history was very interesting. The castle itself was everything I expected a castle to be (a lot of which is apparently decorative and non-functional Victorian-era additions). It was pretty cool.

The kids got bored pretty quickly, though, and Dan mostly chased Liam. When I asked B if he liked it, he replied, “It was ok. Why didn’t kings and queens have more toys?” I was impressed with how stroller friendly it was, but I kind of wish they’d had more activities or information geared towards the little ones.

And, at the end, we got a bit more excitement than we intended — Liam fell, bonked his head on a cobblestone, and got a nasty bump. We left the castle in a cab, headed to the ER to have him checked out (he’s fine) by way of a tunnel under the castle (which would have been cooler under different circumstances).

Our time in Scotland has been too short. In retrospect, I think we planned too much for this trip. We’re not getting to see enough of each place we visit, and we’re spending too much time packing and driving and thinking about our next destination. (We’re stopping in 9 different cities on this trip. I think 5-6 would have been better.) We’re seeing a lot, though, and we’re enjoying it a lot, too. Tomorrow, we head back to England — this time, on the east side. I’m hoping it’s less eventful than Scotland has been!

We left Lockerbie this morning, with two non-vomiting children, eager to see Edinburgh. About 5 miles after leaving our hotel, we were cruising along the motorway when we saw a sign: “Edinburgh, scenic route” and we took the exit.

The drive was only supposed to take an hour and a half — the scenic route added half an hour. It was worth it. This part of Scotland is really beautiful — it actually looks a lot like the Lake District that we loved so much in England, but with the addition of rows of towering pine tress and heather dotted across the fields (and a significantly higher ratio of cows to sheep). We knew we were going to arrive ahead of our original schedule (which was supposed to have the much longer drive from Oban today), so we didn’t have to watch the clock or worry about when we arrived.

Edinburgh itself so far seems really nice. It’s relatively small (having been in London earlier this week), packed with tourists (tons of Americans and Canadians), beautiful and generally pretty pleasant. We’re looking forward to walking around and checking out the castle. (And we’re very grateful for a day that contained neither vomiting nor flat tires.)

I’m also enjoying some of the city’s Harry Potter history. Tonight, we had dinner in the café where JK Rowling apparently wrote a significant part of the first book, and I’ve discovered several place names here that show up as portions of characters’ names in the books. (Not to mention that there is currently a stadium constructed outside of the castle which looks suspiciously like a quidditch stadium.)

In general, though, the pace of our trip is slowing by necessity. The kids are less enthusiastic, less patient, more sensitive, more frazzled and less resilient than they were a week ago (and it’s not just the kids). We’ve travelled a lot over the past week, we’ve been busy, and we’ve seen a lot. So, we’re taking that all into account and doing less on a more flexible schedule. I want to focus on us all having a good time rather than accomplishing a list of vacation to-dos. Tomorrow: Edinburgh and the castle await, but we can take our time. They’ve been there a long time. They’ll wait.

We were on our way from the beautiful Lake Distrct up to Oban in Scotland when B announced he was feeling sick. We pulled over at the first opportunity, but it was too late — he threw up in the car, all over himself. (My poor guy.)

We pulled in to the parking lot of an inn to get us all cleaned up, but after that, we weren’t sure how to proceed. We’d only been on the road for about 15 minutes of a 4 hour drive. We didn’t want to torture B with a long car drive, but maybe it was just a one time thing — we didn’t know if wanted to radically alter our travel plans for a single vomiting incident.

So, we continued on. Twice, he said he was going to be sick, we pulled over, but nothing happened. The third time, he was right, and we decided to rewrite our plan for the day. We pulled over at the next exit and looked for a hotel.

We made it to Scotland (but just barely — we’re 20 miles over the border, in Lockerbie) and we still would have had 3 hours ahead of us to reach our goal. After checking in to our hotel, B continued to be sick, and he was pretty miserable. We think we made the right choice. It’s a bummer to have to pay for two hotels for one night, and it’s even more of a bummer to miss out on an exciting part of our trip — we’ve decided to bypass our western Scotland portion of our trip and just head to Edinburgh tomorrow (assuming we’re all feeling ok).

One of the kids who lives at the farm where we were just staying was sick last night, and he got better in about 12 hours, so we’re hopeful that B will follow the same course.

I know this is the right choice as a mom, but I still can’t help being wistful about the day we had planned (and our day tomorrow, which also has to change). Mostly, though, I just want B to feel better (and I hope Liam doesn’t get sick, too).

For tonight, we’ll keep sitting by our window and looking at Lockerbie (which mostly means watching the sheep and trains go by). We’re happy and cozy all together, and B is resting. It isn’t the vacation day I envisioned, but it’s got all the important parts.

We love the part of the Newlands Valley where we’re staying, but we wanted to see more of the Lake District, too, so we set out on an “hour-long” driving tour of the area. (I knew we’d stop a lot along the way, so I was figuring on closer to 4 hours, rather than 1.)

The route we were following passed just by the end of the lane to our hotel, which was convenient, and the first stop was at the same pass where we stopped the other evening on our way to dinner. (I got the driving tour from Rick Steves’ Great Britain book.) We stopped again at the pass to look around a bit, and while being buffeted by the strong winds, we also got our feet completely soaked. I don’t know if it was rain, runoff, or springs, but almost every inch of the mountain pass was squishy and wet. Very wet. Our ankles got wet from sinking in to the spongy bracken. It was strange — with the elevation, the strong winds, and the fact that we hadn’t seen rain in days, I didn’t expect wet conditions at all. (I had rain boots in the car, and we didn’t even put them on.) We did get to see some spectacular views, though. And lots of sheep.

And then, with mushy socks, we drove down the other side of the pass to Buttermere. We continued on, past many sheep, and beyond our dinner destination from the other night, and found a place to stop and explore the shore of the lake.

We parked the car and strolled down the woodland path to the lake. It had a gravelly shore, beautiful views, and a lot of tranquility. Dan showed the boys how to skip stones on the water while I sat and took tons of pictures. We sat, and played, and relaxed, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The boys waded in until the water poured into their boots, and often we wouldn’t see another person pass by for 15 minutes or more. It was lovely.

Eventually, though, the kids got cold, and we headed back to the car and the rest of our journey. We drove along the lake (more sheep!) and up and over Honister Pass (stopping to pick up lunch at England’s last functioning slate mine) which was gorgeous. We headed down through Borrowdale and we were looking for our next landmark when — pop — flat tire!

We had no phone service, no Internet service, and our GPS couldn’t see enough satellites to plan a route. The kids were wet, tired and getting cranky. And . . . our rental didn’t come with a spare. So, we headed out again, very slowly, found a GPS signal and limped the 7 miles back to our bed & breakfast, past another beautiful lake. (Luckily, “limping home” and normal driving on these roads is almost indistinguishable.)

We made it back, and started on working on getting another tire for the car. While we got it sorted out (over the phone with roadside assistance) we had tea and scones, and our wonderful hosts offered to give us a ride if we needed one. (As it turns out, someone is going to come out in the morning and fix it here.)

We had to cut our driving tour short, and our schedule was completely off for the day, but we put the kids down for naps, because they were really worn out. By the time they laid down, though, it was almost 6, and by the time they got up, it was 8 — and we still had to figure out dinner. Our hosts saved the day with ham sandwiches, and we sat and visited with the other guests in the lounge until much too late in the evening (and we got to hear a lot about how much everyone loves our accents).

It was a great adventure, some fun exploration, and a great day, flat tire and all.