August 08

Last Sunday, we had three fun events. First, my church hosted the Roses - the contestants for the Rose of Tralee. It was a lot of fun to meet them - I made a point of introducing myself to as many Americans as I could, so I chatted with the Roses of Texas, New Orleans, New England, New York, and with the actual, 2007 Rose of Tralee, Lisa Murtaugh from New York. Great fun!

Then, we drove to Glenbeigh for the beach races. This is something that occurs on a few nearby beaches and I have wanted to see one. We couldn't have chosen a more beautiful place - Rossbeigh Beach is unsurpassed in beauty, and the pictures you see of the horses on Rossbeigh Beach with the beautiful Dingle peninsula in the background. These are less serious races than the usual ones at regular tracks, and as you can see the jockies are little boys. It was lots of fun, though windy and cold. The races started 2 hours late because the high wind wouldn't let the tide go out far enough for the horses to safely run. (Last year a horse got disoriented and swam out into the bay and had to be rescued).

After the races we went to Patricia Griffin's house to watch the Kerry-Cork semifinal match of Gaelic football. It was just Patricia, daughter Muireann, and grandchildren Seodhla (you have heard about her in our New Years 08 posting) and Roisin (the baby who was born the day we were visiting in Glenbeigh at New Year). All the rest of the family was at the match at Croke Park, Dublin. We had a really nice time, though the outcome was a shock - Kerry was well ahead the whole match, then Cork came back in the last 5 minutes to tie. The procedure here for ties is to replay the entire match - so it's happening all over again this Sunday! We'll let you know how it comes out.