off up country

Half day in the palace of fun today and I made sure I got out almost on time. I have a weeks holiday ahead, hoooray! So hubs and I started it off by heading up to the Midlands of Ireland, to visit Cloughjordan, North Tipperary.
We have a newly built house here and a wonderful eclectic bunch of friends in the eco village that is being built. We have let our house out so stayed with our friend Oonagh who is renting the other half of the semi we built - it's a mirror image of our house and they are both fantastic. Hubs and I have been busy patting ourselves on our backs at the design, usable space, light and 'feel' of the place. We're really looking forward to living there one day.
This photo was taken on the Cork to Dublin motorway, it was a real rainbow day and it finished with a spectacular sunset to welcome us into Co.Tipperary. The countryside up here doesn't have the rugged spectacular beauty of West Cork, it's got big rolling green hills and is heavily agricultural, but there's a definite Irish rural country side feel to it. This is emphasized in the Butchers, where one side is dedicated to the meat counter and the other is hardware, tractor parts and general iron mongery!