Northern Ireland

Before I get to the spring break stuff, catch-up for the rest of the week:

The House of Commons was...boring.  This depressed me very much.  It was Budget Day -- I wanted people yelling and insulting each other!  But I guess we should have gone earlier for that.  Martin wanted us to meet at 3:00, and we got into the House of Commons at about 3:30 (I got some good pictures of Westminster Hall on the way), but by then there were only about ten MPs still there (there are 646 MPs total), droning on in stultifying speeches lasting fifteen or twenty minutes about economy stuff I didn't have the background to understand.  Very disappointing.  Still, at least I've been to the Houses of Parliament.

Thursday was the last day of classes before break, and I just had one test.  I had an essay due Friday (though he said he wasn't going to start looking at them until Monday, meaning we basically had until then to email them to him), but I finished that in the free time I had before my test, meaning I got in all three essays early.  Go me!  I think I did well on the test, too.  Oh!  I also had a test/quiz in my history class, but that was like forty multiple-choice questions.  There were about eight questions I wasn't sure about, but everyone finished the quiz so quickly that he went over the answers in class, and I ended up getting 100%.  Again, go me!

Anyway, now on to spring break!  My first train was at 9:10, but thankfully the closest tube station (which isn't actually the London Underground, but the Overground, which means I've now been on every single tube line), the one actually within walking distance, had the train that went straight to my train station.  It's much easier not having to change lines.

My first train had free wifi, but while my computer could find the signal, there was some sort of security issue I didn't know how to fix, so no internet on the train.  Which was just as well, because I started getting queasy just looking at the words on my screen while trying to fix the problem.  Bloody motion sickness.  It's the most inconvenient thing ever.  Since I can't read, my iPod is my lifeline.

I made it to Holyhead, where my ferry left.  The first Welsh town we went through was called Rhyl, and I knew it was Welsh not only from the name, but from the signs using Welsh as well as English.  Wales is the only UK country I've seen actively trying to hold onto its language like that -- I'd really only seen Scottish Gaelic at the Scottish Parliament, and I haven't really seen Irish Gaelic in Northern Ireland at all.  (Republic of Ireland, yes -- Northern Ireland, no.)

I'm not sure what I'd been expecting out of the ferry, but it was fancier than whatever expectations I'd had.  My ticket had a seat reservation on it, so I assumed we'd have assigned seats, and so on.  I did not actually find any such seat, but I did grab a couch so I could stretch out, and did not miss the lack of assigned seat.  Before the ferry left, I got a couple pictures of Holyhead from the ferry, and when I go back from Dublin, I'll probably get a couple pictures of that as well.

I could not read on the ferry either -- even looking at my itinerary was making me queasy.  I just listened to music and did a bit of wandering -- the ferry had a cinema with two theaters, a family entertainment center, a shop, two bar/lounges, and a cafe, plus cabins and car decks.  I appreciated it much more than flying.

What I did not appreciate was the delay when we docked.  The ferry was supposed to get into Dublin at 5:30, which is why I booked my train to Belfast for 7:00 -- plenty of time, I thought.  I did get to the train on time, but no thanks to the ferry.  First the pedestrian gangway broke down and they had to get a shuttle on board to get us off, and then the bus that was supposed to take us to Bus Arus (bus station) and Connolly Station (train station, where I needed to go), waited around for nothing to happen.  I finally got off the ferry at about 6:15, the bus left around 6:35, my train wanted me to be on the train twenty minutes before departure, and I didn't even have my ticket yet, I had to pick it up at the station.  Thankfully the bus got us there quickly, and it did not take me long to pick up my ticket, so I did make my train, but it was closer than I liked, and I did not have time to pick up dinner.  The dining car didn't have much of a selection (just those kind of sandwiches with all the butter, ugh), so I figured I'd just wait until Belfast.

I got to Belfast all right, but by then I was tired and decided to take a cab rather than walk the half-hour walk googlemaps told me it would be to my hostel.  It ended up being like a five minute drive, so the cab was pretty cheap.  I checked into my hostel, put my stuff down in my room, then went out to hunt down the elusive dinner.  I wandered around Belfast City Center (just a few minutes' walk away from my hostel) for a bit, then finally found a place to eat.  Belfast City Hall, by the way, is actually quite pretty at night.  It's lit up a bit and there's the Belfast Wheel (a ferris wheel -- what is it with the UK and having ferris wheels near their government buildings?) right next to it, which was also lit up.  I got a picture of that tonight.

I decided to take my shower and go to bed fairly early, around eleven, because I was very tired.  I slept fine, but when I got up I was glad that I habitually take showers at night, because apparently in the morning the shower became more of a trickle, and people were complaining about how they couldn't get any water.

I signed up for a tour to the Giant's Causeway today, which was absolutely wonderful.  The Giant's Causeway, of course, but also the tour in general, because it did so much more than just the Causeway.  We stopped for first a photo op at Carrickfergus Castle, had another one at Carnlough, then the Causeway, then another photo at Dunluce Castle, then fifteen minutes for the shop at Bushmills Whiskey Distillery, and finally the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge.

The tour guide was great.  He talked pretty much continually when we were on the bus from when the bus left around 9:30 to when we were finally done with Carrick-a-Rede at 5:30, pointing out landmarks, other things of note, general history, and anything else pertinent.  Ireland apparently has a high concentration of castles, because I counted eight we drove past or stopped by just on our coastal road.  Also, North Atlantic salmon are almost extinct, the rope bridge was first built 350 years ago, people once taught school in a small limestone cave not far past Glenarm, and Winston Churchill used to own the Londonderry Arms hotel in Carnlough.  And these are only the facts I can remember off the top of my head.

He gave us about two hours at the Causeway, including lunch, and I needed pretty much the full hour and a half left after lunch to see everything on the entire hike.  There was lots of climbing up and down cliffs and rocks, and I don't generally enjoy hiking and climbing all the much, but I had a great time.  It was gorgeous scenery, and I got so many pictures.  It's also just generally very impressive.

I also got several pictures at Carrick-a-Rede, which was less impressive but still had lovely scenery.  You had to pay five pounds to go across the rope bridge, and I didn't want to, so I satisfied myself with just taking pictures of it.  It was another long walk to get there, with several sharpish inclines and climbing, but all the walking and stuff from this trip so far must be getting me in better shape, because I handled today much better than I would have a year ago.  And I've actually grown to enjoy the walking.  I'm going to try and do more of it when I get home.  (I can hear Mom's "Finally!" from here. :p)

We got back to the hostel at about seven, after more free history about Belfast -- our hostel is apparently in the Cathedral District, and is just down the street from St. Ann's Cathedral, which has the biggest Celtic Cross in all Ireland.  I booked a Black Cab Tour of Belfast for tomorrow morning, went out to have dinner, and then decided to come down to the lobby (which has couches and chairs much more comfortable than in my room) to spend some time online before I go to bed.

There's apparently a rave going on tonight, I was informed by some of the people dressed in the most eye-catchingly bright clothes I've ever seen.  There have been so many people dressed similarly tromping through the lobby in the past hour.  Neon tights and bike shorts, paint-splattered coveralls, floofy skirts (on both men and women), creative socks...it's pretty crazy.  And apparently the theme song for my travels is Journey's Don't Stop Believing, because I've heard that song every single day I've spent outside London, either on my iPod or sung by random people around me, this time by some of the people going to the rave.  It's actually pretty awesome, because I like that song, but we'll see how I feel about it at the end of my trip.

It's only been the first proper day of my trip and I'm having such a great time.  I can't wait for the rest of the week!