Scottish Summer - Lamlash, Holy Isle, Inverary, Minard and Loch Gair

 

 

In Lamlash we carried on trying to catch mackerel

 

 

With some success...

 

and then some more success...

 

We also visited the Holy Isle, and saw some great rock paintings.

 

Evening fishing in Lamlash.

 

We then left Isle of Arran bound for Lough Fyne, first stop St Ninians Bay

 

And then up to Inverary

 

After my birthday we motored back down Loch Fyne to Minard

 

And then on to Loch Gair a few days later

Isle of Man, Castle Ward and onwards...

Isle Of Man

 

Port St Mary with John and Elisabeth outside us on the pier

 

Henda works a miracle with our new cockpit bimini

 

Chicken Rock

 

 

Peel Castle at Castle Ward in Northern Ireland

 

Amazing cycle trails and playpark for the girls at Castle Ward

 

Sailing up to Lamlash, Isle of Arran in Scotland

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lamlash Bay

Somewhere in the SW of Ireland, lost in summer

The summer has been wonderful. We spent quite a while painting and preparing the boat and then took of to see more of SW Cork.

John and Elisabeth from Canada - the Hobbits

 

 

 

Henda and the Baltimore singers opening for The Hothouse Flowers at the Glebe in Baltimore

Kinsale for the Sovereign's Cup regatta with Ailbhe and Leslie et al.


Then back to Oldcourt.

 

 

With a stop at various points, but best of all was Barlogue Creek at Loch Ine (our favorite place in Ireland I think)

Long African summer

October 2012

The 6 little cousins from left to right: Mari, Lien, Taryn, Betty, Henda, Maria and Hanlie.

When we were in Pretoria we stayed with Wikus and Dons. We went to school with our cousins.
We dressed up in uniforms and Betty walked us to school. When it was break time every one ate.
We went to many classrooms but they were all noisy.
That is the story of our day in school in menlopark.

Mari

Cork to Kerry and back

 

 

At the end of the summer we still hadn't made it up to County Kerry to visit our friends, Helen and Eoin and their kids. Helen and Eoin were friends from Dublin when we lived there 10 years ago. Helen was pregnant with their first child at the same time as Henda. After the babies were born, Mari made her first friend ever - Tommy. All through the summer, and before even in the Azores, we had been talking about visiting. For one reason or another we still hadn't got up to them and with only a few weeks left before Henda and the kids were to fly to South Africa we finally did that.

 

 

 

When we arrived, Helen and the kids were waiting for us on the dock. But we were going on anchor, so we arranged to meet them in a little while at their house. A long while later we finally got there and Tommy told us we were late. "When did you expect us?" we asked - "In May!!" he said...

 

 

We had a great time with them, even going for a sail and a scenic trip into the Kerry countryside. The girls got along so well with Helen and Eoin's boys. Especially Mari and Tommy were like two peas in a pod. Rauri and Killian also played nicely with Hanlie and the little baby, Liam was unbelievably cute (almost made me broody!). The boys were also Lego fanatics and had the most amazing collection. Mari and Hanlie were in Lego paradise. It was so nice to be there that we decided to stay an extra week. Since this didn't give us time to get back to Oldcourt before the flight to SA, we all caught the train to Dublin instead.

 

 

Summer in West Cork

A photo album of our summer in West Cork