Camino Trail, pilgrimage, here I come!

Since my last blog and writing in Inish Turk I have been back in the Dublin area, meeting up with Arran and Teresa and spending times with family and friends.  Later I first went to Roscommon and spent a week in the beautiful Abbey Hotel pool, helping  a couple of women get over their nervousness and get their legs kicking in the water.  Then I took a bus to county Sligo and visited several of W.B. Yeats haunts and stayed in a hostel in Strandhill beside the sea.  Had great fun assisting a group of volunteers for two days with autistic children surfing in the aquamarine seas of the Atlantic.  After Sligo I went to Donegal and spend a wonderful week in Malin Head, the most northerly point of Ireland; stayed at the Sandrock Hostel, walked a lot, met lovely people, and saw basking sharks leaping happily from the sea!  Saw Danncing at Lughnasa in Letterkenny, spent a night in my favourite hostel in Galway, cycled to the Killarney Lakes, briefly visited Cork in the south of Ireland and returned to Dublin on a sad note.  One of my best friends had passed away a couple of days before.  I was glad to be in Ireland to spend some time with her in July and later with her family.  I feel privileged also to have been in Ireland when my favourite English teacher died at a good ninety plus year old age.

It was especially good to be here for my cousin Helen's 70th birthday party, August 31st.

I have so many memories, this blog cannot begin to describe!  Meantime, close up now.  I will go to see my lovely 96 year old Auntie Evelyn soon and before I leave for Madrid this afternoon.  It has been a wonderful three months and now, my Camino pilgrimage!