After another trouble free, on time, Ryan Air flight, this time out of Manchester, we arrived safely in Dublin. Our first port of call was the rental car village located at the airport, a short shuttle ride from the terminal. If anyone had ever asked me what make of car I would least like to own, rent or simply go for a ride in, I would have undoubtably said a Skoda, so yes, the leprechauns were obviously laughing at me and we ended up with a Skoda. It was diesel...

Following London, the remainder of our time in the Great Britain was spent catching up with family, going on day trips and revisiting some of my childhood haunts. Our first stop was Birmingham where we stayed with a cousin of my mums. Earle and his wife Toni made us very welcome and after dinner at their pub 'The Fiddle and Bone' and a good nights sleep, we headed out to explore Birmingham for a few hours. It was lovely walking around the 'canal wal...

For those of you who haven't been to London before, it's very big, very busy and very expensive, but it's also a very exciting city, with heaps to see and do. We last visited London thirteen years ago with Sarah and Kate, so thought this time we'd try and do some things we didn't have a chance to do last time. - Don't forget to take warm clothes and a raincoat, even in summer. It was 14 degrees Celsius and raining when we arrived. -Do buy ...

We flew into Paris late evening, landing just after 10pm. We had booked the flight on Transavia, which is a budget Spanish airline and apart from the fact they were very strict with the 'one cabin bag only rule', which we had suspected might happen, we had an excellent flight, polite & friendly crew and an almost new plane. Flying into Orly airport we were able to get a train into the city and the closest metro stop was conveniently only two minutes walk ...

Having spent much of the day exploring Córdoba we didn't arrive in Seville until late afternoon, this however still gave us plenty of time to get our bearings and start exploring the city before dinner. Our evening included visiting the 'Metropol Parasol' which is a huge wooden structure located at La Encarnación square, in the old quarter of Seville. It was designed by a German architect and completed in April 2011. It's massive, 150 metres lon...