Easter time touring with family in Ireland

In an amazing feat of logistics, Kathy, Robert, Kathy's three children and their spouses and children all met up in Ireland and toured much of the country this April, around Easter.

Kathy, Robert, Genevieve, John, Bea, Jack and Liam flew from New York to Dublin. Vivien, CJ, Charlie, Austin and Oliver came up from London. Patrick and Kelsey joined the group a little later.

At Cobh Heritage Centre

At EPIC Museum

The 14 toured the countryside together at times in a chartered minibus, and at other times in smaller groups. 

Among their stops were the Epic Irish Emigration Museum in Dublin and the Cobh Heritage Centre in County Cork.

Cobh was an embarkation point for many of Ireland's immigrants to America (as well as the last port of call for the Titanic). 

While in County Cork, the group also visited Blarney Castle, and some (but not all) kissed the famous stone.

In County Claire on the west coast, the group took in the sights of the Cliffs of Moher and visited O'Brien's Tower, built in 1835 atop the cliffs.

Those were just a few of the highlights of a wonderful trip and a great gathering of the clan!

Taking in the beautiful sights of springtime in Newark, NJ (Yes!)

As they've done the past few Springs, Dan and Julie visited Newark's Branch Brook Park in early April to see its cherry blossom trees in full bloom.

The 360-acre park, designed by Frederick Law Olmstead, contains some 5,300 cherry trees in 18 varieties. 

On this visit, D&J also visited the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart, which overlooks the park. It's a spectacular building in French Gothic style, constructed in the first half of the 20th Century. 

The cathedral covers 45,000 square feet, an area equal to that of London’s Westminster Abbey, and is longer and taller than St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City, according to its website.

Although it doesn't have centuries of history like the Medieval cathedrals of Europe, it rivals them in beauty with its rose windows, statuary and woodwork. Pope John Paul II visited the cathedral in 1985 and presided over an evening prayer service. It was on that visit that he designated Sacred Heart as a basilica.

Julie greets a friendly lion across Branch Brook Lake from the cathedral.

Dan and Julie enjoy a visit to Alaska

Following in the footsteps, more or less, of both Dan's parents and Julie's, and as a 35th Anniversary celebration, the couple treated themselves to a sea-and-land trip to Alaska in late August and early September.

They booked a Holland America Lines package that included a seven-day cruise from Vancouver, B.C., up the Alaska coast to the port of Whittier, with stops in Ketchikan, Juneau and Skagway. That was followed by train travel on the McKinley Explorer to Denali National Park, and finally a bus trip to Fairbanks to fly home.

In the course of the trip, and despite some spells of clouds and rain, they saw black bears, whales, sea otters, seals, eagles, at least one grizzly bear, moose, sheep and sled dogs. They saw massive glaciers and amazing landscapes all along the coast and into the mountains. And they caught clear views of Denali, the highest mountain in North America, which is shrouded in cloud about 80% of the time.

• Click here to read Dan's writeup of the trip, illustrated with some of his photos. 
• Be sure to follow the SEE MORE PHOTOS links to albums of photos, with captions, from each leg of the journey.
• Or click here to see all those photos in one album.
• Bonus for rail fans: More train photos!

A hot time at Disney for Dan and Julie

Julie traveled to Florida to attend the Girl Scouts National Convention, held at Disney's Coronado Springs Resort on July 20-22. Although not an official delegate, she enjoyed the activities and events and took notes to report back to the Heart of New Jersey council.

Dan flew down to join her as the convention was wrapping up, and the couple spent the next three days visiting three of the Disney parks - Hollywood Studios, Animal Kindom and EPCOT.

Pacing themselves in the midsummer heat, and avoiding the thrill rides that had the longest lines, they had a great time exploring the parks. Neither had been to Disney Florida in decades. Only Dan had seen EPCOT before (on a long-ago trip with young Marie and Danny), and neither had seen the Hollywood and Animal parks. They finished up by watching the EPCOT fireworks, then flew home on the 26th.

A birthday-celebration weekend in Los Angeles

Dan and Julie visited Christine and Jamie in Los Angeles in early January to celebrate Christine's birthday. Highlights included a visit to the Getty Center museum, where Julie and Christine posed before an appropriate sculpture, "Draped Reclining Mother and Baby" by Henry Moore.

The weekend began with a stroll on and around the Santa Monica Pier, and then to a movie theater to experience the new Avatar movie in 3D.

That evening, the group toasted the birthday girl at Harvelle's Blues Club in Santa Monica, where they were entertained by a New Orleans-style jazz band called Alligator Beach.

The visit to the Getty was the following day. "We could only see a fraction of Getty Center, as it's enormous," says Dan, "and that's just one of the two Getty museums in LA. But we enjoyed both the exhibits - including a collection of drawings and sketches by Dutch artists - and the grounds themselves."

That evening, the group had a fine dinner at an Italian restaurant, La Bruschetta in the Westwood neighborhood, that has become a C&J favorite.

D&J stayed through Monday, and while Jamie worked, they and Christine visited South Dakota the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures - a new attraction in the city, which opened in late 2021. This selfie was taken in front of Mount Rushmore a painted backdrop used in Alfred Hitchcock's "North by Northwest."

Outside the museum, heavy rain arrived that afternoon, part of a series of storms that caused flooding and mudslides in various parts of California during January. Some streets in the LA area were flooded that night, but fortunately, there were no such problems in C&J's neighborhood. And the skies cleared for D&J's flight back to New Jersey the next day.

Dan and Julie visit Dublin

Dan and Julie combined their trip to Scotland with a few days in Dublin.

Arriving Sunday and departing Thursday (Dan's birthday), they managed to catch a sold-out concert by popular Irish singer Mary Black...

 

...tour Dublin castle, see two cathedrals, visit the National Museum of Ireland...

...and hike along the Irish Sea coast at Howth.

They also saw a bit of Dublin's rock-and-roll history and caught live music at pubs in the Temple Bar nightlife district.

Click here to see a collection of photos from the trip!

Many have captions, which you can see when you click on the individual photos. You might also need to click the info icon (i).

Visiting Scotland for curling and more

As Rebecca and her teammates competed in the World Mixed Curling competition in Aberdeen, Scotland, eight members of her family traveled to cheer on Team USA and see other sights in the British Isles.

Rebecca's parents, Doug and Lisa, toured other Scottish cities before and after the competition, as did her Aunt Cathy and cousins Chrstopher and Stephanie. Her Aunt Julie and Uncle Dan combined a week in Aberdeen with four days in Dublin, Ireland. And sister Liz visited London, joined the group in Aberdeen and then toured extensively in Northern Scotland.

The Team USA foursome of Caitlin, Jeff, Rebecca and Jason were proud and happy to represent the Rochester Curling Club and Curling USA. On the ice at Curl Aberdeen, they enjoyed the competition and camraderie that characterize the sport. The team played hard and smart, ending with a won-loss record of 3-4 in the round-robin, short of the cutoff for the playoffs. In a Facebook post, Rebecca thanked "the most amazing teammates in the world. I can't think of better folks on and off the ice to have shared this experience with."

 

The trip provided a great opportunity for family members to get together as spectators and tourists. Just a few highlights: 

Dan, Julie, Cathy, Chris and Steph went on a small-group tour of the Highlands, including a boat ride on Loch Ness. 

Urquhart Castle alongside Loch Ness

On a rare sunny day, Doug, Lisa, Dan and Julie took a long walk through downtown Aberdeen to the beach on the North Sea. 

Castlegate Square in downtown Aberdeen

Touching the North Sea

And the whole family group joined Rebecca's teammates and their families and friends to watch Aberdeen Football Club defeat Partick Thistle in a Scottish League Cup quarter-final match.

Pre-game dinner

We had great seats!

Individually and together, clan members packed their trips with experiences all over the Scottish landscape - too many to list here. A big collection of photos taken by various family members is being compiled in a Google album.

Click here for a visual travelogue of the trip!

Dan and Julie visit Christine, Jamie and Dan in California

Dan and Julie traveled to California in early May and had a wonderful time visiting Christine and Jamie in Los Angeles, and then Dan in Santa Cruz.

This was D&J’s first opportunity to see the apartment where Christine, Jamie and their cats have settled in since their cross-country move in late November. It’s in a quiet residential neighborhood in West LA, close to the Santa Monica city line and just two miles from Jamie’s office at Riot Games.

Over the next couple of days, the quartet visited the Santa Monica beach and pier; Griffith Park, in the Hollywood Hills overlooking the LA sprawl; and a botanical garden on the UCLA campus.

Following their weekend in LA, Dan and Julie took a short flight to San Jose, rented a car and drove to Santa Cruz, meeting the younger Dan at his apartment just a half-block from the beach on Monterrey Bay.

The trio visited the Santa Cruz pier, where they looked down at the sea lions and out over the bay toward the Big Sur mountains in the distance. They paid a brief visit to a small lighthouse just up the coast, where they could see more sea lions sunning on a rock and surfers riding low, long waves.

Then they drove several miles inland and uphill to Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park, where they walked a loop trail through a forest of towering Coastal Redwood and Douglas Fir trees. 

“Although it was a quick visit, we packed a lot in, and it was great to catch up,” said Dan.

For a full report on the trip - plus albums of photos - click here.