I have not been as committed as I wish I could have been to this blog, but I am determined to make a comeback and rededicate myself to reading 100 pages a day. I have made 2 trips to Ireland since I last posted, and they were wonderful. In February, my daughter and I went to Killarney for the All-Ireland Championships. In April, we went to Dublin for The World Championships. These were both for Irish step dancing. At the All-Irelands, my daughter won the title in her age group, and at the Worlds she came in second. We are both very pleased. On both trips, we did some sightseeing - visiting castles in the south of Ireland and for the Dublin trip, I wanted to go see Trinity College and the Book of Kells, but it didn't work out, so we'll have to save that adventure for our next trip. We visit Ireland/England/Scotland about 4 times a year, and I love visiting all the ancient historical places. In particular I loved staying at Dromoland Castle with friends and learning about the Smith O'Brien family that I'm reading about in The Great Shame. I still have not finished this book and it is really terrific at covering the Irish who were sent to Australia for minor crimes and mainly for standing up for their legal rights as tenants or maybe plotting against the British. At this point, I think I will write some short reviews on the few books I read in the past two months, and take it from there. I'm almost finished Galway Bay too. I really enjoyed this one! Here are a few pictures:
Ross Castle in Killarney:
Inside Dromoland Castle:
Bunratty Castle:
On another note about Irish dancing. There is a new documentary coming out about the 2010 World Championships called Jig - the movie. It won't be available in the US until the summer of 2011. One of the dancers focused on in the movie is in my daughter's dancing school, and we think she might show up in some part of the movie. My daughter hopes so. Here is the trailer for the movie:
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