October 12, 2013: A Lunch Gathering at Barbara's
	August 3, 2013: The August Birthdays
	Return to Index for 2013

For a half year now, Prudence Ruckman and her sister Nancy and their husbands have been talking about the four of them plus Fred and I and Guy Blair making a trip to the British Isles. In April and May, Nancy's husband Karl did a lot of work on where we might go and what we might see and where we might stay, with Prudence and Nancy eventually choosing the B&Bs and hotels where we would have our lodging. My responsibility was to book the air travel, once our travel dates were set.

We eventually decided on a trip involving three different itineraries. Fred, Karl, Nancy and I would fly to London on September 9th and return from Dublin through Chicago on September 27th. Neither Nancy nor Fred wanted to be away from home for much more time than that. Prudence and Ron wanted to spend a few more days there than us, and so they would leave on September 5th, meeting up with us in Bristol, England, on the afternoon of September 10th. Prudence also wanted Guy Blair to come along, and so had me arrange travel for him from Chamberlain to San Antonio on the 1st of the month, so he could spend a day or two there before driving up with them to Dallas, a birthday dinner for Nancy, and their departure together. They spent three days in London ahead of our arrival.

Karl, Nancy and Prudence did a great deal of planning, and you can see the itinerary shown visually on the map of the British Isles at left. Karl, Nancy, Fred and I flew to Londown Heathrow on September 9th, arriving there the morning of the 10th. We made our way to Bristol, meeting up with Prudence, Guy and Ron at our hotel on the afternoon of the 10th. We stayed in Bristol two nights, then took the train northeast to Haltwhistle, where we stayed one night to tour Hadrian's wall. Then it was on to Edinburgh for four nights, which included a day trip to Stirling, Scotland. Then we continued north to Aberdeen, where we stayed two nights.

Then it was a drive back south for a one-night stay in Carlisle followed by a one-night stay in Liverpool, where we turned in our van. The next day, we took the ferry across to Dublin, Ireland where we stayed for one night, picking up another van on the next day for a drive to Galway for a two-night stay. Finally, it was back to Dublin for two more nights prior to our return to Dallas via Chicago on September 27th. (Guy would leave us in Chicago, return directly to Sioux Falls and then drive back to Chamberlain.)

It was an intricate plan, and for all but three days of the trip, it worked perfectly.

As I have done with other major trips, I'll have an album page for each day of this trip, and on this page will give you an index into these pages. That index is below. To use it, you can click on any particular date to go directly to the page for that date. I have listed the major activities for each day in case there is something specific you want to see. But if you would just like to accompany us on the entire trip, as most of you will, just click on the first day in the upper left corner of the index. Once on that first page (or any page) there will be the usual links to get you to the next page or the previous page. Whenever you wish to continue on through the photo album past this major trip, please use the "RETURN" link that you will find at the top and bottom of each page to come back to the top of this page. There, you will find the links that will take you onward or backward through the photo album.

We hope you enjoy coming along with us to England, Scotland, and Ireland!