Category: Uncategorized (Page 4 of 6)

Today was a big day and we still ended up in the hotel by 6:30pm tonight! I was not too upset about that because after the miles we walked today (10+ miles), our feet were screaming at us. We don’t walk this much usually. Even Kegan said his hips were hurting. My ankles were what was yelling at me. ha

We got up at 5am to be out of our hotel by 5:30. Norah wasn’t ready to vacation yet.

We got to the airport, I couldn’t check in online, I kept getting an error… so we got there and the line is wrapped around waiting to use the self-serve kiosks… finally get up there and the kiosk tells me the same thing- see an agent. Finally got boarding passes to head to security and they said “seat unassigned”… so I was pretty sure we must not have seats on the flight and we likely wouldn’t get on the flight anyway after the debacle getting on this flight to begin with. So, we get to the gate and I go to the gate agent… who looks in the system….. and then… promptly sits us in first class. ha

NOT the outcome I was expecting. So, Norah and Kegan got to fly first class for the first flight of their lives. and likely only the 4th or 5th or mine honestly… Now, the flight was only 1.5 hours… and they don’t really have beverage service…and they weren’t serving booze at 7:30am… hahaha so, really, it was just the bigger seat this flight…. but still, very cool when I was expecting to be sitting in Indy waiting on a noon flight. ha In our hotel tonight, we watched the news and saw that the next flight out from Indianapolis to LaGuardia today had a “security incident” and as they were landing, a passenger was making threats about having a bomb and the people on the plane freaked out and deployed the slides and evacuated the plane on the tarmac! supposedly people were shoving other people out. Good lord. and to think, if we wouldn’t have gotten the first class seats, that would have been us! LOL would have been an interesting start to “slide” into NYC. ha

Getting an Uber was super easy from LaGuardia airport, so that’s what we did. Had him drop us at our hotel near Times Square so we could have them hold our bags in storage until this evening as it was still before 10am at this point. We tried to grab a slice of pizza across the street before setting out, but they had only baked the sicilian deep dish so far…and Kegan was really looking for thin crust new york pizza. So, we carried on.

Our first stop walking south was the New Yorker hotel. This was truly where I wanted to stay…but its hard to beat free… so the Holiday Inn with points, it was. I love the history of this hotel. It’s been a New York landmark since 1930. Very art deco hotel. Famous for its huge Red roof sign on the skyline.

The hotel was outdated before it opened in 1930, really -months after the great wall street crash and right at the beginning of the depression. It had 2500 rooms, 3 ballrooms, and indoor ice rink, restaurants, etc… and it opened in the worst economic period in US history….

Because it was designed and built in the 1920s, it was built top of the line to coincide with the era, the era of big building and skyscraper competition, opulence, and excess – built with a private power plant in its basement and an underground tunnel to Penn Station. The tunnel remained open until the 1960s when they demolished Penn Station- supposedly the most ornate and amazing train station in the world- to build Madison Square Garden, making the original Penn Station the most glorious landmark you can no longer see but is historically significant because the backlash over demolishing that station led to the creation of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, which has saved hundreds of other landmarks since- including Grand Central which we’ll be seeing in a bit.

Anyway, the New Yorker! Nikola Tesla lived here the last 10 years of his life, living in rooms 3327 and 3328.

A historical photo exhibit in the basement had multiple media items on Tesla. He seemed to have really went off the deep end at the end of his life. He ventured out to Bryant Park to the same corner to feed pigeons every day, carting back injured and sick birds to his hotel suite…and actually falling madly in love with a white pigeon… saying “I loved that pigeon as a man loves a woman, and she loved me. As long as I had her, there was a purpose to my life.” 

Consipiracy theories abound about a “death ray” energy beam Tesla was shopping around to governments and private business near the end of his life. When he died, his notebooks in a safe in his suite were never located… some speculate that the government “collected” them to ensure no one else could build his ideas, including potentially his death ray.

In the 30s and 40s, NBC broadcast Big Bands from the Terrace Room of the New Yorker, including Benny Goodman and other big names. This was a GI Station for departing WWII troops before departing for overseas, so small town boys shipping out spent a couple days in this huge city in this building. In 1971 – Muhammad Ali rested here after his famous Joe Frazier fight that he lost and in 2016, Hiilary Clinton gave her presidential concession speech at the ballroom.

The lobby is still very similar to the 1930s original, although the ceiling murals are all tiled over and they’ve added some white woodwork in front of the green marble pillars

When it opened, the New Yorker Hotel equipped every hotel room with a radio. In 1948, the hotel had the most televisions within a single building in the world.

They were also ready for 2021 back in 1941, using “Protecto-Ray UV lights” in the bathrooms for sanitization starting in 1941 – with the added benefit of having all treated bathrooms sealed with cellophane!

Let’s bring that back! Our hotel last night had handprints on the headboard (yeah….disgusting) and tonight there were M&Ms on the floor and we don’t have M&Ms. ha I hate what passes for clean in hotels these days.

Next we walked past Madison Square Garden- the world’s most famous arena. Named for our 4th president, James Madison. Its the home of the New York Knicks since 1968, Ali fought Frazier here in 1971, the Pope John Paul II visited here in 1979, Pope Francis in 2015, 3 democratic conventions, 1 republican convention, Marilyn Monroe sang her famous birthday serenade to JFK here in 1962 and countless artists have performed here. Elvis, John Lennon, Dylan, Stones, Elton John, The Who, U2, Springsteen… currently Billy Joel does one show per month in a first ever residency at Madison Square.

Our next destination was a bit East on 34th Street to the original flagship Macy’s store. This is the Macy’s from Miracle on 34th Street in 1947, was the first department store to have a store Santa Claus and was the first major retailer to promote women to the executive level. Macy’s was opened in 1902 by Rowland Hussey Macy. By 1924 they were the top employer in New York. They started the Macy’s day parade, which eventually became the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Macy’s got the red star logo that is still their symbol because the founder used to work on whaling ships and got a star tattoo… so he used that for his store’s logo, too.

We were here for the escalators, though… this 9 story department store still has the 1920 wooden Otis escalators on its upper floors. So cool.

Norah needed some sugar at this point. She was already tired and got up too early. ha

Found a juice vendor and that perked her right up.

We got our own sugar juice at Starbucks next door, too.

New spelling of my name. lol But, I did get my first pumpkin spice item for Fall. I absolutely love their pumpkin creme cold brew.

We turned north up 7th Avenue to see a couple statues dedicated to Jewish garment workers (as we were in the garment district)

Now it was time to get some food for us. We stopped into Empanada Mama’s for some lovely cuban empanadas.

We walked on along until we got to Uncle Tetsu for a Japanese cheesecake. Tetsushi Mizokami founded his bakery in Japan in 1985 and these jiggly fluffly japanese cheesecakes are baked fresh daily.

Ours was still warm from the oven.

We popped a seat nearby and shared it. It was good…but almost a little eggy tasting. I was a bit underwhelmed, but still ate every bit of my 1/3. lol

As we were sitting there, Norah asked me to do a panoramic shot of her in front of a cool building, so I did….

Then, she wanted to do one of me. Fine…. mine didnt turn out as well. hahaha

We headed to Bryant Park next. Its a great green space with a putting green, some patio tables and food vendors. There is a small section of tables with free board games to borrow and play. We went to Nikola Tesla corner to see the spot he fed pigeons and then visited the carousel.

We walked to the other end of Bryant Park to go inside the New York Public Library. The building is insanely gorgeous. There are two lions out front Patience and Fortitude. The names of benefactors on the walls was impressive- John Jacob Astor, Andrew Carnegie, Alexander Hamilton, John D Rockefeller, Jr.

This branch specifically houses 1st edition Shakespeare works, the 1st Native American language bible, a Guttenburg bible and the original stuffed dolls that inspired Winnie the Pooh.

We then headed for the Chrysler building. This is Kegan’s favorite building, along with about 90% of all architects in the world.

I’d have more photos but the second we got through the revolving doors, the security guy said the lobby was closed and we routed right back out. So no photos of the super cool art deco lobby.

This building was briefly the tallest building in the world for 11 months before the Empire State Building was completed. Apparently, Mr. Chrysler asked for his toilet to be the highest in Manhattan so he “could look down and shit on Henry Ford and the rest of the world”. The building has the most ornate and expensive lobby in the city. a ceiling mural, African marble, gargoyles that are the same design as the 1929 Plymouth hood ornaments and the 31^st floor corners look 1929 Plymouth radiator caps. The 1920’s was definitely the age of the skyscraper with multiple competitions and one-upmanship happening. The Chrysler building’s spire was actually a secret architectural change, assembled inside the building and then pushed upwards and attached to the top at the last minute after another rival building completed construction and declared itself the tallest in the world. Immediately, the Chrysler building erected its secret spire to ruin their claim. ha Sounds about right from banking, car and railroad magnates. Replace skyscrapers with trips to space and our billionaires are still doing the same thing today.

Next up was Grand Central Terminal, the most famous train station in the world. 250,000 people a day go through Grand Central.

The Main concourse is really the star of the show with its Zodiac ceiling and amazing windows. The ceiling was painted like this in 1914 when Grand Central opened, but by the 20s, it was leaky and people joked there was a “mildew way” along with the stars. In the 1940s, they fixed the leaks, put up asbestos panels over it and repainted the mural. During a cleaning and restoration of this 1940s ceiling, they left one brick uncleaned to show the tar and nicotine that had built up on the ceiling from decades of indoor smoking.

This Opal face information clock is estimated to be worth 20 million dollars. It is accurate to within 1 second every 20 billion years!

We walked around the dining concourse and to the whisper galley – an arched ceiling area underground where you can hear your whisper in one corner all the way on the other side.

We purchased our 7 day unlimited Metro cards here. $33 a person gets you unlimited rides on all the buses and subways in the city for an entire week. We may have been cheaper to just pay per ride… but I didn’t feel like dealing with that all week. Laziness and easiness wins when we’re talking about a 10-15 dollar difference. ha

We made our way over to the subway concourse and rode north on the 4/6 line to the 51st street station. Saved us 9 blocks or walking or so and tested out our subway cards.

A few cool buildings along the way

We walked south a block to see the front of the Waldorf-Astoria. We couldn’t stay here or even see the inside lobby because the entire building is shut down for remodeling until 2023. The original Astor hotel was on the site of what is now the Empire State Building. It was built in 1893 by John Jacob Astor. John Jacob Astor’s cousin, William Waldorf Astor, built a competing hotel right next door called the Waldorf. Basically, they were so rich, this is what they did to annoy each other.

Eventually, the rivalry ended- they connected the two hotels via Peacock Alley, a walkway between them and it became the Waldorf-Astoria. This was the first hotel with electricity on every floor, all of the rooms had ensuite bathrooms and the first 24 hour room service, including the famous Waldorf salad- apples, celery, grapes, walnuts, and a mayo based dressing

This current building was built in 1931 with 1416 rooms, no two the same. It had a hidden train track underneath the building that connected to Grand Central known as Track 61- it was used by FDR during his presidency

Marilyn Monroe lived here after her divorce from Joe DiMaggio (more in just a sec on that!), Cole Porter lived here for 30 years, from 1934-1964 and his famous piano that the hotel gifted to him remains in the building, Prince Rainier III of Monaco and Grace Kelly held their engagement party here, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor lived here when he abdicated the throne- there is still a Royal suite decorated to Wallis Simpson’s tastes as it was when they resided in the hotel. Queen Elizabeth gave a speech here in 1957. Frank Sinatra lived here in the 1980s, Paris Hilton in the 2000s. Would have been cool to see, but I can’t wait to see the restoration when it reopens. I hope it still retains the history.

Walking towards Rockefeller Center and St Patrick’s cathedral, we passed a famous landmark that wasn’t really a landmark. The subway grate at 52nd and Lexington is from the 1952 Marilyn Monroe film The 7 Year Itch where her skirt famously flies up and it became a worldwide symbol. This scene actually led to Marilyn’s divorce from Joe Dimaggio as he thought this risque act was crossing a line. (You married a 1950’s Hollywood sex symbol, dude… what did you expect? ha)

We walked past St Bart’s church- neat facade

We went inside St Patrick’s Cathedral. It definitely seems to be the most famous cathedral in the United States. Pope John Paul II even gave mass there in 1979 on his visit to the US. It is the largest gothic revival church in the United States, I see why it’s such a must-see, especially in the US because we don’t have these huge cathedrals stateside- but it seems we should have seen this first to be super impressed, because after seeing a couple of the cathedrals in Europe we were a little underwhelmed…and that sounds so snotty haha I promise I don’t mean it that way! Ha its still an impressive structure but I just don’t think it’s as good as Rouen or a few others we’ve seen. The size wasn’t as big, the woodwork wasn’t as intricate… but I still appreciated it. And it did have a great vault. I am a sucker for a cathedral arched vaulted ceiling.

Next we walked to Rockefeller Center and Radio City Music Hall- the showplace of the nation!

Radio City is the largest indoor theater in the world. Saturday Night Live (SNL) films here, as does the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, the Late Show with Seth Meyers, the Today show and others. It’s also the home of The Rockettes.

Norah is obsessed with SNL- the girl has watched so many older classic SNL episodes and she hardly misses a new episode. I tried to get tickets to watch a filming but you have to be 18 years old to attend and if I remember right, you had to apply for seats for the whole season and then they tell you which taping to show up for. Obviously that wasn’t an option for us.

Right then and there when I told her SNL filmed there she was ready to stop touring New York and just sit and wait for the actors to arrive for the evening. (It was 3pm ha) we managed to talk her into just watching SNL live from a few blocks away at our hotel later that night. Luckily. Ha and we did! Kim Kardashian was the guest host, Halsey the musical guest… and she stayed up until 1am watching it, commenting the whole time “I cant believe that they are just a couple streets away right now doing this!”

We waited in the queue outside of Magnolia Bakery which is famous for their banana pudding.

We got our treats and walked the block to the Prometheus Statue and where the Rockefeller Christmas Tree usually stands. It seems they are prepping it for winter and the ice rink. It was all torn up and blocked off

We ate our banana puddings- which objectively were very good, but nothing we couldn’t make at home. Vanilla wafers, southern style banana pudding with chunks of bananas and very vanilla’y thick whipped cream. BUT… I can see why southern style banana pudding could become a hot commodity this far north. They don’t know every good church going woman worth her salt can make this for you for the Sunday pitch in where we’re from! ha

It was getting close to our last reservation of the day- our tickets to The Top of the Rock. We purchased CityPass tickets for the week and it paid for entrance admission to quite a few sites we would be visiting anyway and saved a lot of money. One of the sites was the observation at the 67th-70th floors of 30 Rock.

We had our passes verified and our vaccination status verified (yes, in New York City, almost every place is requesting or requiring a mask regardless of vaccination status.. and you must be vaccinated and show proof to enter or eat anywhere inside.)

The lobby of 30 Rock on this side held the Joie Chandelier made by Swarovski with over 14,000 crystals in the shape of upside down 30 rock

You could see for quite a while from the deck! Even on this overcast and gray day.

The Comcast Building/30 Rock construction site was the site of the famous construction worker photo of some guys hanging out on a beam in the sky eating lunch.

So, as a tourist trap, they make you take green screen photos on the beam… and then ask you to act like you’re falling off the beam for the last one. Norah really liked this one, so we got suckered into buying a $27 stupid photo because I’m a pushover and it made her really happy. haha

After this, that wrapped up our itinerary for the day and we were way ahead of schedule due to arriving much earlier than I had planned. We decided to walk back to the hotel all along Times Square and the Broadway Theater district

We arrived at our hotel, our bags were still sitting in the lobby from 10am. Even though I specifically said “those are going into the storage room, right?” “oh yeah, of course”… and there they sat at 6pm. Luckily everything was still inside… but I had my laptop in there, an iPhone, Norah’s iPad, Airpods, etc… like, a LOT of expensive electronics! But… I wasn’t a jerk. ha They did give us a room on the very top floor. I’m not sure if that’s desired or not. Your view is better, but you also have to wait a very long time on the elevator… I was happy enough.

The room is very small, just enough room for the 2 beds, with a sliding pocket style door for the bathroom. No closet, no microwave… but again, you just cant beat the price. ha

We got a pizza from across the street at Upside Pizza for dinner and called it a night, watching TV and lounging.

Tomorrow is supposed to rain all day off an on, so we’ll see what kind of trouble we can get ourselves into.

Today was a leisurely day making our way from northern Portugal across the parques and mountains of Northern Spain. Mostly just driving goat path roads over mountains and through tiny towns. I tried to grab some shots that might do the views justice, but they really don’t.

We passed through a tiny village with these flower arches over the narrow little mountain road. No idea what are for… but they made me smile. ha There was a guy here outside smoking his morning cigarette in his pajamas at 11am. That made me giggle, too. I could live here if they had wifi. ha

We stopped along the highway at a “cafestore” which is basically a gas station that has drinks and a food counter… which , let me tell you- most gas stations do not even have water or drinks. That was a weird finding. ha I walked into one and it was just a bare store with some motor oil and a guy reading a paper looking at me like i was a weirdo. i said “agua?” and he smirked. no…. so i said “baño?” and he smirked again and told me where it was. haha Apparently, most everyone else in Spain knows gas stations don’t have anything inside. ha I’m trying to figure out how we didn’t run into this issue on our last trip, but multiples this time had this “issue”. Also- another strange finding… a lot of restrooms will be outside of the main building… and with no paper products. No soap, no toilet paper.. but they have a bidet beside the toilet. So, noted and quickly, I started carrying my own toilet paper. ha I still haven’t quite figured out how the bidet fixes everything. Now, you just have A LOT of water dripping off places that want to be dry. haha…i know-TMI.. but seriously. I wonder how most people utilize these facilities.

So, anyway.. this cafestore.. we ordered ham and camembert sandwiches for lunch. Norah had a hamburger and french fries. surprisingly good for gas station food!

Our trek across Spain led us to the town of Ponferrada to the Templar Castle in town. A king gave these castle grounds to the Templars in the 1100s to help protect the Way of St. James, also known as the Camino de Santiago- a great Christian Pilgrimage. (More about that tomorrow) They built more and more defensive structures as their power and their numbers grew…

It was a cool castle. Lots of remodelling, new parts added, etc… but still nice to tour.

Norah pretended to shoot arrows at invaders through the slit windows.

This other little girl that we kept meeting while walking around gave Norah this rock. So Norah was super excited and called it her “lucky rock”

We did find this creepy tv face pointed up to us narrating in angry Spanish when we went into the basement level of one of the rooms and looked over the edge. ha I think I can gather from the Templar clothes, the sword in the case and the creepy storytelling, they were discussing the mysterious missing sword of Jaques de Molay- the leader of the Templar Knights who was burnt at the stake by the King of France (as discussed a couple days ago). Legend has it that the sword is somewhere near or around this castle since de Molay walked the Camino de Santiago and fought here at the castle.

They had replicas of period outfits which I thought was cool. Check out this guy’s shoes! ha

After the castle, we went out to the countryside to our rural tourism hotel- Hotel Via Avis. It was really cool. a 500 year old renovated house turned into a 6 room hotel. The couple that ran it was so sweet. We really liked it and could not recommend it more.

He recommended we go to dinner at this little family place in town that involved us driving down a gravel road… but we found out later that they closed on Wednesdays. So he recommended a second place… then he called to verify they were open.. nope. ha So..in the end he recommended a place in the “big city” of Astorga 15 minutes away. Serrano’s. We were looking forward to a big plate of Spanish pork and sausages like is customary in the area, but the owner said this place was known for mushrooms and partridge… so it was the best we could do. ha It was wednesday after all. How dare we try to eat out on a wednesday in this area? ha

We were one of 3 tables in the place and the 1st to arrive. The waiter recommended a starter called El Cicero, which was basically Iberian ham with duck liver and olive oil. So good.

There was no kids menu and we hadn’t eaten much all day (keep in mind it’s already 9pm because #spain.) so, Norah ordered the Salmon. She was very excited to order “El Salmón” on her own. ha

I had the patridge because the hotel owner recommended it. It was very good and had a rich mushroom sauce.

Kegan had a deer loin with creamed potatoes.

We took a look at the dessert menu and I got what the waiter recommended-La Leche Frita. It was basically a mushy creme brulee. but it was good.

Kegan got some sort of “queso” dessert… which was like a cheesecake.

The chef came by to see how we liked our meal and gave Norah this pretty flower. The chef spoke great English. the wait staff did not. Where was he the last hour??? ha BUT… that’s OK, anymore in Spanish I feel pretty comfortable when we travel and can usually do just fine conversationally.

The waiter decided to pour us two glasses of what appeared to be port to go with our desserts. In the end I asked him what it was- he said it was a “wine typical of the region” called Limonata. A red wine, with lemon and orange juices and spices mulled together. It was VERY good. I’ll have to try to remember this for another visit to the area.

We drove back to our hotel at 11pm and crashed. 🙂 Last day tomorrow! and some amazing steak.

We were really lucky to own a home in a really quick moving real estate market…so our house was sold within 10 days! (Still about 9 longer than I thought it would take).  So now came the tedious task of packing it up and figuring out how to get everything to Ireland…and how to get rid of the things we knew wouldn’t make sense to take…or wouldn’t fit in our new small little cottage house.

Our poor house went from clean and put together for sale:

To this: haha

A lot of people have asked how we moved our stuff to Ireland..for us, it was actually easier than when we moved stuff anywhere in the US. and because of our close proximity to the ports on both ends, shipping our stuff via shipping container on an ocean cargo freighter was cheaper than moving it between states with a mover in the US. sad… We struggled with finding a company that would just ship a container… almost everyone I contacted wanted to pack the container for us… which of course was going to be crazy expensive… and probably would not have packed it as well as we did ourselves. Also, most companies wanted to deliver the container and you had to have it loaded in under 2 hours. We knew this couldn’t possibly happen, especially given that the container was 5 feet off of the ground on a truck trailer… We finally found a company that would drop the container off, pick it up 5 days later and would let us pack it ourselves…plus they were up front in their pricing model and fees…so as long as everything arrives- they were amazing. haha

We had the choice between a 40 ft full size container or a half-container that was only 20 feet long. Since a 40 ft would’t fit in our driveway and would have meant loading up loads of UHaul trips to go fill it, coupled with the fact that we don’t have that much room in Ireland, we decided that we were going to fit everything we owned into the 20 foot container…. and if it didn’t fit, it had to go! So, needless to say…a lot had to go. haha

Luckily my mother had just bought a new house, so it was sort of serendipitous that almost every piece of furniture we were going to sell or give away, she could use!

We needed so many packing blankets to pad all of the furniture, because we had learned our lesson previously from using PODS and moving stuff ourselves that the little road bumps and repeated rubbing pretty much make it useless to move anything if not completely wrapped up and padded.

Luckily, Kegan found a couple listings online for used packing blankets… so we saved a bunch of money because they were $9/piece at Harbor Freight and we needed 70+ of them haha

The truck arrived on time, even if the driver did back it up into the roof of the garage. we screamed at him to stop when we realized he wasn’t planning on it… and he only dented in the guttering thankfully. moron.

Some of us were more thrilled than others about the whole packing experience

Halfway Through

Almost done!

We finished up loading the last item AS the semi pulled into our neighborhood at 7am…so we didn’t have time to do a final walk through to make sure we didn’t miss anything. we did really well! we only forgot one box. it just so happened to be the box that contained every pair of shoes I owned. lol  (I did later manage to fit all but about 6 pair into our luggage that we took with us on the plane…so just an excuse to buy new shoes.)

The last day of packing, our housekeeper Nilda stopped by with her kids to wish Norah a happy birthday. (because it WAS Norah’s birthday! ha) She’s the best. 

Norah wished for “Mavis makeup” for her birthday….so I had to find a way to do Hotel Transylvania dress up makeup with the 5 or so makeup items I still had unpacked haha I think I did ok!

After it was all packed up in the container, we had the final clean up, dropped by Coral Springs to pre-sign all of closing paperwork and headed on up towards Indiana. Kegan headed up towards Ohio to drop the Penske rental truck of furniture off with him. It must be hard to be a part of this traveling family.

After we got to Indiana, Norah got to go see Uncle Kaleb at the fire station! 

We had to drive to Frankfurt, Kentucky to get a vet certificate for moving Izzy overseas. Hands down, the hardest part of an overseas move: bringing pets! geesh. Now, we could have used a shipping service, but I quoted it out at it was going to be $2700 to use an “all inclusive” pet shipping service… OR… you could get some stuff yourself and ship the pet United Cargo for under $600. So, obviously, we chose to do it ourselves. That could be a blog post in itself… but in short, it required going to a local vet, getting a tapeworm vaccine within 5 days of travel, then taking that paperwork to a USDA Aphis vet, which there is only 1 per state… and the Indiana crazy cat lady was on vacation…so her backup is Kentucky. So, driving to Kentucky, then taking all of that paperwork, with your dog in an approved carrier (also…soooo many rules on this) to the cargo area of the departure airport. To jump ahead a bit, when we got to the airport, the lady told us we were missing a domestic form (that i assumed we didn’t need since we already had the more in depth international form) and we had to haul tail over to a local Chicago vet to get a form filled out and get her dropped off on time. Then when we got to Ireland, United gave us totally wrong info on where to pick up the dog, so we “lost” her for a couple hours haha When we did locate her, it was at a vet’s office 10 minutes away and they had no idea they were supposed to be receiving her because United never told them she was coming and I had to pay another $300 for the Ireland import and vet services…so in hindsight- I can see why people use the services!!! But all is well that ends well. 🙂

Back to Indiana- after the Kentucky trip, we did some fishing at Rob and Sherri’s house. My dad bought her an R2D2 fishing pole for her 4th birthday, so we invited some people over for some kid fishing and some campfire food. 

We had Norah’s 4th birthday party on Saturday. She said she wanted to be “just like Rey at a Star Wars birthday party” back when the new Star Wars movie came out… and of course the nerd in me was OK with that! haha She does think its “Bo-Bo Fett”, “Dark Vader”, and she thinks “Storm Trooper” is one single guy’s name…but hey- I still call it a win. haha

We spent Sunday with as many people as we could fit in and then headed to Chicago to drop Izzy and then board our plane. Pretty uneventful other than the last minute vet cert we had to go get. We got to our gate with 30 minutes to spare and got Norah a Happy Meal just in case it was a while until she got another… and like any typical 4 year old… chicken nuggets make the world go round. 🙂

You always know you’re flying over Ireland. That green patchwork is pretty distinct.

We arrived, found dog eventually and headed towards Ciara’s apartment- our stop for the next 4 days until we head to Sweden for the vacation I booked on Black Friday last year. I may have worn everyone out 🙂

Hello everyone!
It feels like its been forever since I’ve done any blog posting…in reality its only been about 6 months… but a lot can happen in 6 months! Like, making a life-changing decision to move across the world. haha

So, that being said- we made the decision a couple months ago to jump in head first and relocate to Ireland at the end of August.

Usually the first question I get when I say that is “Have you ever been there?”. I find this humorous…I mean I know we’re adventurous… but I think you’d have to be crazy to move someplace you’ve never even visited, right?? To be truthful, we haven’t been there as much as most people who would uproot their life and move across the pond- but we’re pretty familiar with what life in Ireland will be like.

The next question is usually, “Is it for work?” No, not really. Although, it did start out that way. I did a little freebie consulting and proposal review for the government of Ireland’s health initiative a little over a year ago and began making some Irish connections, knowing their country is getting ready to embark on the electronic health record journey that the US did .  That led to some face to face meetings back in February and lining up a long term Meditech project outside of Dublin. So, we were pretty much going for work for a year or two… until the facility decided to pause their project and wait a year or so before continuing. I think that we were both so committed to going and excited about that adventure, that when the opportunity wasn’t there, we started discussing the feasibility of going anyway! ….and here we are.

I’ll continue to work remotely for now for a few clients that I have active, continue to run the business from Ireland and hopefully use this as a catalyst to finally take more of an admin role and less of a lead consultant role over the next couple of years. (Now, that being said…I’ll probably end up doing the exact same thing I do now in Ireland as soon as the first opportunity is offered. I just cant turn down work. haha)

“Do you have a place already?” Yes. and no. We bid on and won a house at auction back in May. We paid our deposit and have been waiting on final contracts until this week (arrived in the mail today!) So, once both parties sign, we will be legally bound to purchase the purchase- and they will be legally bound to sell it. So, it’s in the works… but with as slow as things move there in real estate, I’ll be surprised if we officially own it by the date we go over on August 29th.

I don’t have any great pictures of the house, but you can view it from Google Maps here:

https://goo.gl/maps/bjDy9jXEh552

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It needs work inside, but it is just perfect. I have big plans for this little place. I’ll make sure the entire remodel and move project is documented here as we go.

Lastly people ask if we are really that scared of Donald Trump. haha The answer to that is YES. GOD YES… but not the catalyst for our move.

We have a lot of small reasons that added up to this making sense but some of the main reasons were that we love to travel…and Europe is a great jumping point for travel to just about any place. Instead of 3 plane tickets costing $3k or more to go for a trip…. most tickets are under $100/person. We can get to Paris in 1.5 hours and $60 round trip. You just cant travel from the States like you can from Europe.

Another major factor is our long term plans. We wanted to get ourselves to a low cost of living so that early retirement and homeschooling Norah are options for us. Not to get too political or critical….but it really is getting harder and harder in the US for the middle class to get to a point of retirement just due to the little things that add up. Housing prices, utilities, cell phone prices, cable, health insurance, homeowners insurance, property taxes, rising cost of food, etc… just to LIVE means you need a significant amount of monthly income- more than afforded on social security…and more than most people will have at retirement. Not to mention the cost of a college education for 1 or more children… the prices for college are just laughable at this point… and I just cant see pouring 100k or more into a 4 year “experience” for an 18 year old. (I am well aware I don’t HAVE to pay for any of it… but that’s a responsibility we want to take on as parents).

Enter Ireland:

This country house and barn on 2 acres was the equivalent of $72,000. Granted, it needs updating and remodeling…so the final price will be around $100,000. However, then we own it. Like, own it. No property taxes annually, no homeowner’s insurance (At least not in the way we know it in the US). Water is “free” but now has a new tax they have started… 2 years worth of back water tax on this house that will be owed when we acquire it is $90. So, something….but not what we pay. Electric is a competitive market with options…and discounted prices when you sign up- like DirectTv here. ha Plus, their temperate climate (although way colder than Florida!) means no AC needed… and the house has a cozy little wood stove/fireplace and oil fired heating with radiators, keeping bills down.  A SIM card for your cell phone with unlimited data, text and minutes is under $30 a month. Food is cheaper than it is in the US and such a higher quality- fresh milk, fresh local eggs, local butchers with meat raised and butchered in the same little town.

Healthcare is free once you’re a citizen (which will take 6-7 years to attain) but in the meantime, you can buy top of the line private insurance that has maternity coverage, mental health, prescription drugs, orthopedic clinics, etc… for $200 for the whole family a month. Compare that to the $600 we pay here for the equivalent of major medical. And that insurance works everywhere in the world except the United States. That should tell you something about the status of our health system.

Also, college. Now Ireland doesn’t have free college. It will cost you to study there…but not like the US… but being a part of the EU (and no- Ireland is not a part of Brexit…Ireland is it’s own country haha) you can travel, work or live in any of the 27 EU nations. That means Norah can choose college anywhere in Europe, some of which are free or very low cost if we attain Irish citizenship.

There are a couple things I wish were a little different. Guns being the main item. Growing up in the US, having a gun in the house for protection gives you a little peace of mind. In Ireland, you cant own a firearm without a distinct reason to own one…and personal protection isn’t a reason, especially if you aren’t a citizen. So that will take a little getting used to… also, cars are taxed by the engine size so owning an SUV or a van or a truck might mean you pay $2000 a year to register it vs about $200 a year for a little hatchback car. So, we have already picked out our car for Ireland: a 2011-ish Honda Fit. will run us about $8500. Also, I had to promise Kegan he can buy an old Land Rover Defender or a Toyota FJ40 at some point for making him sell his Toyota FJ Cruiser here before we head over. I told him we would discuss when the house is finished. haha

So…overall, it totally fits our short and long term goals…and gosh darn it, the Irish are just awesome people…and it really may be the most beautiful place on the planet. I hope anyone who can, buys a ticket over to Ireland and visits us and lets us show you around some of our favorite spots. And who knows…in a year or two, we may be moving everything back going “well, that was fun… but it’s just not for us”…and thats OK. 🙂

That being said, the original use of this blog to share vacations every six months or so will likely change….and I totally understand if you don’t want your email inboxes cluttered up with weekly posts from me about little trips or home remodeling.  Feel free to unsubscribe and I will not take it personally in the least!

I actually bought a new website domain that is more fitting to our lives: GypsyMcKaravan.com

I’m working on moving all of the blog over to the new domain and ending FreshInnocentsAbroad… but I still have to see how that will work for the subscribers, I may have to have you resubscribe in the future, but we’ll tackle that when we get there.

Before we leave south Florida, we decided to do a little “staycation” next week and see all of the things in Florida a good tourist would see. Another post to kick off that trip is coming tomorrow.