Arkansas Travelers: January 2011

Alyssa, January,2011

Our great niece, Alyssa Wall (daughter of Sue, granddaughter of Nancy and Hal) is an aspiring actress. She spent last summer with Forestburgh playhouse in New York State, where she had a unique opportunity to act in many productions - she was chosen to do this from amongst many applicants from all over the US. She has now moved to NY City and is starting the rounds of auditions. Forestburgh contact her to reprise her role as Juliet in their adaptation which they were taking on the road - to Ireland. We were so excited, and planned this for 2 months. It all worked very well. They were based in Adare, Co. Limerick, and had performances in several places including Kilkenny, Galway, and Nenagh. However, they had several nights in Limerick, so we drove to our B&B in Adare on Saturday afternoon and met Alyssa at the venue - The Loft - in town centre Limerick. Our first thrill was walking down the street and seeing a poster of Alyssa on the lamp post. We then saw the real thing - sitting in the pub downstairs from the production venue. We had a great time visiting with her and the troupe photographer, Meredith. (pictured above: Dana, Alyssa, Meredith, MFE).

Then our friend Kate joined us. She, Dana and I had dinnner while the others prepared for the performance. We then enjoyed the performance - and especially enjoyed Alyssa, who was superb. We spent a while visiting afterward. On Sunday, we went to the beautiful house they were renting and visited for a while, then took Alyssa on a bit of a tour. We drove down the Shannon to Foynes and took pictures in front of the Air-Boat Museum (it was closed). We had lunch in teh same pub where we had lunch with Nancy and Hal 3 1/2 years ago. We then drove to Limerick and saw a few landmarks and enjoyed coffee and tea in a pub, then dropped her off for the evening performance. It was a short visit,but so much fun to have her in Ireland!

The pictures below were sent to us by Meredith.Rutledge, the photographer who was traveling with the troupe. She is in the first 2 pictures above. She very kindly gave me permission to use them on this blog, even though she is a professional photographer.

On the right, here is the real thing - with the poster on the street that I mentioned above. On the left, Kate, Dana and I buying our tickets.

This is Alyssa (Juliet) and Romeo, in a production - not sure which venue this was. The two below are posed at King John's Castle in Limerick (I think) - first Romeo and Juliet and the bottom one just a beautiful one of our personal Juliet!

The Bowens, December 2010

John,Lorraine, Pat and David arrived a week before Christmas, in the middle or our record setting snow and ice siege! This was Pat's first trip to Ireland, and he didn't get to see too much, but here are some wintery scenes of some familiar places: Ardfert, Ross Castle, and Torq Falls.

Here are a couple of nice bird shots. Top on is a chaffinch, bottom is a robin (which are a different species than US robins).

Since they were leaving NY Eve morning, we had an early celebration - early by being both a day early and nowhere near midnight! This is at Blennerville with the lighted windmill behind us. Below at the Station House in Blennerville.

Lorraine did a wonderful job as cook's assistant, bottle washer, nurse and confidante - but not least of her jobs was the great job of decorating for Christmas. These pictures are by MFE.

Mick and Jeanne October 2010

Mick and Jeanne came for their second visit in October. They went to Dublin and Newgrange for a few days, then toured Kerry (both new and old spots). They also went to Clare to tour the Cliffs of Mohr and Doolin and had a spectacular sunset while coming back on the ferry.