Our month trip throughout Europe went perfectly and was way more enjoyable then we could have EVER anticipated! I am so glad we took the leap to do this because it was an absolute BLAST!! There are just way to many pictures to do one blog post about our entire trip so I decided to break it up and do blog posts by county! Plus each country had unique things that we loved so doing blog posts by country just made sense! First up, Ireland!

We flew into Dublin because we found these amazing cheap round trip tickets that were half the price of anywhere/country we were looking at and we just couldn’t pass it up! We actually hadn’t planned to spending any time in Ireland when we were first planning our trip but once we found these tickets it just made sense to add on another country. Scotty and I are SO glad we did because Ireland ended up being one of our favorite places! After getting into Dublin late we rented a car, found our Airbnb (super funny and embarrassing thing happened to Scotty on our first day but I will let you ask him about that yourself!), and went to bed. We got up at around 5:30am so that we could get an early start to the day. We only were going to be in Ireland for 2 days so we had to make it count! From Dublin we drove 3 hours to the west coast to visit the Cliffs of Moher (AHHH SO PRETTY!!!) It was rainy (it even hailed for a bit) and was seriously the windiest day/place we have ever been to but just oh so cool! You could hear the waves crashing against the cliffs and there was a misty fog in the distance that made the cliffs look gigantic against the ocean waters! It was hard to even walk because of the wind but it just reminded us of how small we are in comparison to our Creator.

After spending sometime there hiking around the edge of the cliff (yes the ledge was just open in some parts, so scary but so awesome) we spent the rest of the day with no agenda but driving around Ireland, enjoying the scenery, and getting to stop whenever we wanted! We ran into castles, sheep, donkeys, beaches, pastures, local farming/living, and so much more that we wouldn’t have seen if we hadn’t rented a car. We were nervous before we left because we knew that it was all on the shoulders of our planning but we are thankful to God because every part of our planning went perfectly for our entire trip. When the first day turned out great we were instantly reassured for the rest of our trip! We had spend the hours planning and researching now it was time to just enjoy!

After day 1 adventures we came back to our Airbnb in Dublin and spend the night. The next day we drove north about 3 more hours into Northern Ireland (part of the UK) and saw the Giant Causeways. We purposely made our schedule very flexible so we could change things up as we went as well. The Giant Causeways were literally added on last minute the night before because we thought it looked like a good addition to the castles we were going to visit! Oh was it a good decision! That was also one of our favorite days because it was such an unexpected adventure that turned out to be SOOOO gorgeous. They were on the coast of Northern Ireland so seeing another coastal area was so gorgeous. The Giant’s Causeway is an area of about 40,000 interlocking basalt columns, the result of an ancient volcanic eruption. Basically thousands of hexagonal stepping stones that went on until they disappeared into the ocean! Such an amazing sight/hike/day! That night we drove to the airport, returned our car, and headed to Scotland!! Scotland was one of our top 3 favorite countries so prepare for a huge post to come! Now to all the photos from Ireland!

There are a mixture of our i-phones, Scotty’s sony point and shoot, and my big camera! Enjoy!

The wind all day was crazy!! Moments after this picture was taken as we were walking around the edge I just fell down because of the wind. Scotty got the whole thing on video, it was pretty funny!  This area was a random coastal area we found on the side of the road which is another perk on renting a car!
The beginning of Northern Ireland! Above is a picture of the first thing we saw when we started our hike to the Giant’s Causeway!

Top 10 Random Observations about Ireland:

1. There is green EVERYWHERE!! Everything is clean and spotless and perfect in the country. Roads, farms, houses, everything is perfectly put together.
2. “Driving on the left side of the road is kind of fun!”…says Scotty but he (I learned on this trip) is an abnormally good driver and during our whole trip was maybe thrown off for about 5 minutes in every new country and then drove as if he driven on those roads his whole life. On the other hand if I had to drive I would have not had the same reaction haha! I am thankful Scotty took over the driving during our entire trip! Such a blessing!!
3. Sheep are everywhere and the little lambs by their mommies are seriously the cutest thing ever!
4. Gas stations are basically supermarkets which made it nice because we just made sandwiches on the go during our whole time in Ireland (also a great cheap option)!
5. People don’t have lawns (or really small if they do), just pavement. They drive their cars right to their front doors.
6. McDonalds there is super modern and way cooler then any McDonalds I have ever seen in the States! They cracked and actually cooked real eggs for our breakfast sandwiches in the morning and their bacon was the flavor of our bacon but the look of our ham here. Overall McDonalds is actually cool there!
7. Everyone is a good driver and we didn’t see any cars with dents but that doesn’t mean they aren’t crazy! On rural roads through curvy narrow hills the speed limit would be 60mph. Not to mention their roads were just a little wider then one of our lanes in the states. Even though their cars are smaller then ours it still seemed so unrealistic and needless to say we drove a lot slower then the speed limit on these roads! lol
8. Ireland is a pretty desolate place. Besides Dublin (their biggest city) we didn’t really run into that many people
9. In Dublin there were the cutest pubs everywhere and every early morning they power wash every sidewalk and street. What did I tell you, everything there is clean and put together!
10. Most of the housing throughout Ireland looks the same but people pride themselves in having unique and different doors. So you will see many amazing colored doors if you go there! I have a postcard titled the doors of Dublin! haha

If you are interested in purchasing any of my photos from Ireland for your home you can take a look at my shop here!