Chauffeurdrive in West of Ireland

Well my latest tour is underway and what a wonderful start we made today. My companions, two lovely sisters from New York, have been trying to locate their ancestral home for the past fifteen years. Today, at last, they finally arrived home. Eileen had sent me a phone number that she acquired from a telephone book and last week, before they arrived in Ireland, i called the number. It turned out to be in an area on the borders of Roscommon and Mayo. The lady i spoke to confirmed that eventhough their name was Jennings, we had the wrong Jennings. She told me that she had married into a Jennings family but that her mother-in-law would know a lot more about any other families by the same name in that area. She told me that her mother-in-law lived with them in a granny flat with her husband and she said that she could bring the phone to her. I had some details of Eileen and Kathleen's Great-grand parents and as i related them to this elderly lady Nora, she told me that we were in the right place. Her family were not related to the Jennings family that we were looking for but they were neighbours many years ago. She told me that she had been in their house on many occasions as a child and remembered their Grand-mother well. I asked her if she would allow us to visit when the ladies arrived and she agreed. Today, that was where we went. What a wonderful day we had. Not only did we get a real run-down on the family history but her son walked the land with us to the remains of three old houses which the family had lived in a different times. They were now just ruins and had been used as sheds for the cattle since the family left. The land and the old houses had been sold by the remaining living members of the family who had stayed in Ireland. Standing in these old homes with no windows, and roofs that were falling down, was a moving experience for the ladies and we took a lot of photos. We also were able to take a few small stones from the walls of the old houses as souvenirs for the ladies to bring home to the USA. Before we came here today the old lady Nora had given me a phone number of one of their cousins who was living in Dublin. Last night we called her and she is going to meet the ladies when they get to Dublin at the weekend. She was equally excited and i can only imagine what that reunion will be like. Eileen kept saying that this was the best day of her life and i was so happy for her and Kathleen. The Jennings family that we visited today treated us as though they were real cousins and they made us feel so welcome. Nora and her husband live in the same house as their son and his family. The granny flat part is really lovely and they are so well looked after by their daughter-in-law Ann who is a really lovely girl. The area they live in is remote and one can only imagine what terrible conditions the family lived in back in the eighteen hundreds. No wonder they had to emigrate. Today they have more opportunities and they do not depend on the land as they did then. Tom is a carpenter and it is easy to see that they are able to make ends meet as their house is lovely and they all look very happy. Our time with them today was so nice and it only reaffirms in me just how warm and friendly Irish country people are. No matter how little they have they would always share it with you. I know that our visit with them today was not an imposition and that they were just as excited to see us as we were to see them. I know that it is something that people from other countries find hard to understand but that is the way we are here. Yes, the Irish are a lovely friendly people, and long may it last.