Hello again, Blogonauts! We are thoroughly enjoying the legendary Irish hospitality and countryside. Each day has been full of activity, so forgive my uncharacteristic silence here. Communication falters when the time is otherwise engaged. Once we left Dublin, we traced a winding path through Kilkenny, Cashel, Waterford, Cork, Blarney, Cobh, Kinsale, Clonakilty, and other spots along the southern Irish coast. My normal blather is replaced today by a gallery of...

Hello again, Blogonauts! My fellow junketeers and I are off on a new adventure, this time to the Emerald Isle! We arrived in Dublin early on Wednesday, and on our way to our lodging, our chatty cabby gave us an improptu tour of his family history, Irish national sports, his whiskey recommendations, and incidentally, the city itself. Once we off-loaded our luggage, we headed out for a walking tour of our own. Dublin offers a delightful first impression: youthfu...

(FYI, I arrived home late on Sunday, May 15, but you deserve a couple of remaining blog entries for a complete narrative of the trip. So here goes!) Hello, again, Blogonauts! Hhow sshould wwe iintroduce Aachen? In case you were not yet aware, Aachen fell next on this stumble-footed steeplechase around the western edge of Germany. And here, let's begin by addressing the most obvious oddity: "Aachen" is a weird word. It's not as if German vocabulary abounds wi...

Hello, again, Blogonauts! Rhetorically, you may ask where I am: Am I in the Celtic region of Europe? Am I exploring Rome's ancient civilization & culture? Or am I in modern day Germany? The only accurate answer to all three questions is, "Yes!" On Sunday I scooted back across the border into Germany to visit Trier, arguably one of the most broadly historic cities in the country. Back in the Bronze Age, Trier began as a Celtic city, which means they had a ...

Hello, again, Blogonauts! I have just spent a day-and-a-half in the storybook-styled Alsatian city of Strasbourg, France. Although it sits a stone's throw from the German border, it is a million linguistic miles away. The city is truly a wondrous anachronism. If the Brothers Grimm had survived into the 21st century...well, first off, they would be miraculously old. We would have loads of questions, such as "How did granny survive in the belly of that wolf?" But...