Artifact

If you're a student of archeology, Ireland is a great laboratory. Structures like those at Newgrange and Howth from the stone-age are incredibly well preserved. Beehive huts, stone circles, and ancient churches still stand the test of time without mortar holding them together. Johnny, a kid from Memphis we met on Inisheer, was lucky enough to travel as an archeologist and study the amazing past of Ireland.

If you find interest in the science of archeology like Johnny, the National Museum of Archeology in Dublin gives a great overview of early Ireland, it's people, and it's evolving culture. The best part about this museum- it's FREE! Save your few coins for an ice cream afterward people watching on Grafton Street.

A week after we got back to Portland, there happened to be an archeological roadshow at OMSI (our science museum.) We were encouraged to dig up any native American relic, artifact, or fossil that may be laying around and get a professional appraisal on your piece. The best part- it's FREE!

We went down in the basement and uncovered an artifact we've had since the West Linn age (our old house). There it was, amongst our lodge room relics, a stone carved into some sort of axe head. Dan, a professional at this museum event gave us the following appraisal, "This stone was most likely carved by the mid-western mound builders, used to fell trees." That very stone I was holding in my hands was a prehistoric chainsaw. Awesome!

So naturally, we sold it, my pet rock, on EBay. Rock on, Barney Rubble!

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