Slainte! Cheers to Ireland!

Three words: Love it here.

What's not to love about a country with my name written all over the place?





I love those O'Keeffe solicitors.




And O'Keeffe pharmacists (though we've never met!).





Oh yeah, did I mention we're in Kerry County?

Now I just need to find myself an O'Keeffe's pub so I can have another Irish pint. Because just one won't do, right?



As the Irish say, "Slainte!" Cheers!

Looking for some good craic

Where can I find some good craic?

Murphy's Pub. That's where.

But first, I needed (yes, needed!) some fish and chips.



And an ice-cold pint.




Craic pretty much means a good time and that's what I found at Murphy's Pub with these guys.




They were getting down. They played a mix of traditional music and rock.

Sausage, Eggs and a Heine

Headed to Ireland!

But first ...




Just found this tempting offer at the Amsterdam airport. What more could you ask for at 8 a.m.? Tempting, but think I'll pass.




Time to board. Looking forward to finding the O'Keefes when I land. Just don't know how I'll break it to them that we threw the "O" overboard on our way to America. At least that was my Dad's story.

Operation Amsterdam: Part 3

With Operation Amsterdam coming to a quick close (a flight to Dublin was already booked!), I had only three very important must-dos left on my list.

Cruise, explore and devour the canals, the Anne Frank Huis and the pannenkoeken. In exactly that order.












The first two were easy. We took a beautiful canal cruise right to the Anne Frank House.

Okay, I admit the third was easy, too. For dinner I ate my way through the biggest pancakes you've ever seen. From the list of salty pancakes I chose cheese and pineapple.






From the list of sweet pancakes I chose the biggest, baddest pannenkoeken I could find, topped with cherries, strawberries, pineapple, kiwi, bananas, whipped cream, ice cream and powdered sugar. It was a.maz.ing.







Dank u well, Amsterdam. Thank you, Amsterdam. And tot zeins. Goodbye!

Operation Amsterdam: Find coffee shop. Find pannenkoeken.

I made it to Europe's most 17th-century city, home to around 750,000 progressive Dutch bike-riders, Amsterdam.

Cue Operation Amsterdam.

That means I need to check out, hit up, eat, stroll down, inhale and cruise through the Van Gogh Museum, a wooden clog maker, pannenkoeken (the famous Dutch pancakes), Leidseplein, the sweet aromas of the De Pijp District and a few of the many, many canals. Not necessarily in that order.

First I checked out the Van Gogh Museum. If you like Impressionism, you'll love this place. And if you like someone with a good story, you'll love Van Gogh to death (well, you have to, he killed himself after 37 troubled and artistically brilliant years). Even if you don't know much about Van Gogh, I guarantee you'll recognize a few pieces: Sunflowers, The Bedroom and a self-portrait or two.

Then I hit up the De Pijp District, conveniently located right behind the Heineken brewery, where I had the burden of deciding between all the Indonesian, Irish, Chinese and Dutch cafes (plus countless others), and grabbed a bite to eat and a Dutch beer to wash down that bite to eat.

I also managed to squeeze in the Verzetsmuseum (Dutch Resistance Museum) for an intriguing history lesson on how the Dutch resisted Nazi occupiers during World War II.

Sure I wouldn't need the lesson if I hadn't slept through AP European History my senior year of high school, but walking through the exhibits and reading the heartbreaking stories of people who lived on the very street I was standing on in the middle of Amsterdam ... well, that's just something I never could've grasped from the third row in the windowless-classroom next to the cafeteria in the middle of Arkansas.

Operation Amsterdam continues tomorrow. Those pannenkoeken won't eat themselves!

Not easy being Belgian

Well, the waiter caught me. It's not easy pretending to be Belgian when I can't even read the menu or manage to get off at the right bus stop. So much for that.

I can pass for Dutch though right? Any advice on making that happen?

BTW, I ended up ordering the croquet monsieur met frietjes and a Hoegaarden Blanche.




Ham sandwich with fries and a Belgian beer? That translates just fine in my mouth!




Delish!

Quick! Somebody tell me what vleesbereidingen is!

Sitting at a sidewalk cafe, De Gulden Valk, in Gent pretending to be Belgian and trying to dissect the menu with Google Translate. Too bad Google doesn't know Flemish!

Help! Somebody tell me what vleesbereidingen means. And should I get it with kroketten or gemalen kaas?

Tea & Crumpets

We're having an amazing time in England. Tea today and crumpets tomorrow! Love it!

This morning we took a bus to the train station in Bath, hopped a train to Paddington (Bear) station in London and then caught the tube (always minding the gap of course) to Victoria Station where we walked to our hotel.

But that was just before noon!

In the afternoon I made it over to Parliament Square to spend more time with my friend Big Ben.




I've hit all these spots so far, minus St. Thomas'. But that's only because I'm not driving on the other side of the road, yet! We all know how risky that is for me.




Chaucer, Dickens and Hardy are buried here. William the Conqueror was crowned here. And, oh yeah, some people named William and Kate just got hitched here. Can I just say Westminster Abbey is awesome?




After the Westminster Walk, we took a ferry to the Tower of London where a jolly Beefeater (or Yeomen Warder) gave us a tour inside the castle walls. And then I saw them. Yes, them. Let me give you a hint. The line to see these things put the lines at Disney World to shame. The crown jewels! I saw bejeweled tiara after bejeweled tiara. And to top it off I saw a gigantic golden punch bowl. I think it said something about holding over 100 gallons. It is exactly what every queen and castle needs (ahem!).

Cheers!

Tiniest country I've ever seen

Two words: Vatican City. Two more words: Holy Moley!

Do I need to repent for just saying that? Oh well, around here there's plenty of holy water to go around.

All joking aside, this itty-bitty (around just 100 acres) country was awesome. There's just no other word for it. No, I didn't see the Pope, but I joined 1.1 billion Roman Catholics in St. Peter's Square to stand in line for the Vatican. Okay, I'm kidding. Only one billion were there.

We were hit up by a couple sketchy "tour guides" offering to sell us tickets, but we said "No grazie" and kept walking. After seeing the line wrapped all the way around St. Peters though, we were quickly tempted by a ripe deal to shell out some extra cash for a guide and to skip the lines.

That's when another woman approached us, asking if we wanted to join a tour. She pointed us in the direction of about a dozen people standing around listening to a guide do a pre-tour. We joined them.

But then the guide walked us out of Vatican City and all the way down the street to a little cafe to collect her money from the group. We weren't having it.

We wanted our museum tickets in hand before handing over our sweet poorly-converted euros. We told the tour guide we follow a strict not-getting-swindled policy and asked if we could pay inside at the main desk. We did, and we were back to smooth Vatican sailing.

You really have to visit the Vatican to understand it.
But when you do, make sure you cover those shoulders and leave your short shorts and mini skirts at home. Or else you'll be sweating more than a ...

I'm sure you've heard the expression about sweating more than certain people in church.

The St. Peter's guards are here to throw the dress-code book at you and you'll be wearing your socks taped to your shoulders before they'll let you through.

I have to confess: going to the Pope's personal chapel was a little intimidating. The Sistine Chapel blew me away. It was incredible to imagine Michelangelo painting the story of creation on these walls all while up on his scaffolding where he slept, ate and painted for four years. Now that's what I call dedication.

Well, that and my newfound dedication to gelato. I've fallen madly in love. What am I going to do? And where can I buy bigger pants?

When in Rome...

The Colosseum has always been the first image to pop into my head when I hear "Rome" and finally I was going to see it. Not via Wikipedia. Not via Google images. But via my own eyeballs!

I never could have imagined the feeling I'd get when approaching it though. It gave me goosebumps at first sight. I envisioned first the Romans chiseling the concrete in 80 A.D. and later it holding 50,000 rowdy fans cheering as wild animals popped out from behind blinds, surprising and attacking gladiators, who then fought to their deaths in this 2,000-year-old roaring death chamber.

We tangled with our own swindling, plastic-sword-touting gladiator just outside the Colosseum. When we stopped to take a few photos he approached us, putting his little plastic sword to Kristal's neck and his hat on Jamie's head. We snapped a few pictures and then he demanded five euros. I pulled out some loose change to offer him but he demanded five euros again, showing us the thick wad of cash in his wallet from all his other swindled tourists.

He refused my small change and we walked away with him following us, still demanding money, but finally he gave up and we escaped with some cute photos and a good lesson on avoiding a quick hustle thanks to our modern-day gladiator.

Our tour of ancient Rome didn't stop there. We headed to (possibly) the most important dirt in Western civilization -- the Roman Forum. We oohed and awed over crumbled pieces of columns and walls as we walked around Rome's birthplace and once thriving civic center. Rubble has never been this awesome.

We strolled through more rubble -- the remains of ancient palaces on Palatine Hill (this is where we get the word palace!), before dragging our aching feet to the supermarket to pick up Italian groceries for dinner. We had (you already guessed, right?) pasta and wine, because what else are you supposed to do when in Rome ...