Today was a relatively quiet day, after the hectic schedule we have had all week. The team started our day with a visit to the Mayor of Limerick, John Gilligan.

Today was the 25th birthday of Colm, the coordinator of our Irish World Harmony Run - here he is, all smiles, presenting a certificate of appreciation to Mayor Gilligan.

The Mayor and his daughter very kindly provided a delicious morning tea with really excellent scones.

Salil from Australia was all smiles after eating three of those fantastic scones.

The next item of business was a stop at Superquinn supermarket - Superquinn have very kindly provided food for our runners both back in Dublin and now here in Limerick. Here the Superquinn tem in Limerick are holding the torch with our Russian runner, Svetlana.

And then the running to Killarney began in earnest.... so where are we going? Consulting the map is a constant activity out on the road.

Standa from Czech Republic cranks out some miles.

Rupashri from New Zealand met Kevin Barnett who joined her for 2km in his street clothes. Kevin is an accomplished marathoner.

 

The clouds covering the McGillicuddy Reeks, on the road into Killarney.

 

Aivaras from Lithuania finishing his running for the day - one of these days we are going to enter him into a 'World's Brightest Smiler' competition; his cheerfulness really is an inspiration to everyone on the team.

Baridhi from Bulgaria enjoys the Irish countryside.

Below you can see two of the three support vehicles we are using on the road to drop off and pick up the runners after they have finished their relay stint. The World Harmony Run van has done us great service over the years, bringing the team on three European-wide runs, each time visiting almost 50 countries and covering 24000km.

In addition, here is one of our local support cars - very good for things like advance school visits and shopping...

While we're on the subject of vans, we would like to thank Total Fitness in Castleknock for providing us with towels for the runners to sit on to keep the van nice and clean, and also water bottles for the whole team. Here is Louise from Total Fitness holding the torch with Matthias, Purnendu and Adhiratha...

 

We arrived at Ross Castle on Sunday evening, where the team were taken out on the lakes of Killarney by Dermot O'Donoghue (seen there standing at the back) of O'Donoghue Boating. Thanks very much Dermot for giving the team a taste of Killarney's beauty.

 

 

Katka from Czech Republic dons a life jacket in preparation for our tour of the lake.

We took the boat out to a nearby island, with lots of ancient ruins of churches...

Everyone is all smiles and waving....

Back on land, Sundar holds the torch outside Ross Castle...

We then travelled the short distance down to Muckross to meet Lynn from the Killarney Education Centre, who showed us to our accommodation - a lovely hostel nestled between the mountains and the lake in Killarney National Park. A big thank you to Lynn and Chris for looking after us.

Standa, who works as a cook back in his hometown of Zlin in the Czech Republic, finally had his long awaited opportunity to prepare a home cooked meal for the team.

As we celebrated Colm's birthday a few of Ireland's little people showed up to join in the festivities.

This little fellow may indeed have been related to Colm, for he bore a striking resemblance to the birthday celebrant.

Happy Birthday Colm! Colm has done such a fantastic job of coordinating everyone and keeping the whole show on the road, we really don't know what we'd do without him...

– Salil Wilson

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Distance: 104 km

Team Members:
Adhiratha Keefe (USA), Boijayanti Badillo-Gomez (Puerto Rico), Kallola Brown (New Zealand), Rupashri Brown (New Zealand), Salil Wilson (Australia), Purnendu Knezevic (Serbia), Sundar Dalton (Ireland), Katka Purusova (Czech Republic), Svetlana Gorschkova(Russia), Aivaras Zydelis (Lithuania), Colm Magee (Ireland), Baridhi Yonchev (Bulgaria), Standa Zubaty (Czech Republic), Matthias Eckerle (Germany)

Harmonemail:
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