We were given more info concerning the reputation of the Europa Hotel in Belfast. It was the most bombed hotel in Europe because that is where the world’s media and politicians stayed and bombing that particular place got the world media’s notice. The Opera house next door also was peripherally involved w/ the bombings.
Last year the LAST British soldier left Belfast and the Guard towers came down. For them this is a huge event.
There is “serious” barbed wire around the top of the fence around the Royal Hospital still.
Before leaving Belfast, we visited CULTURLANN—a politically neural organization whose purpose is to foster cultural education of all children of Belfast. They teach CEILI (pronounced kay-lee—which means Irish dance) and also the Irish language (Gaelic) An old Presbyterian church building houses an Irish language radio station, the foundation school (sort of like a community center) and various other organizations. It includes a café and gift shop. Collette tours is one of the sponsors of this foundation and before the trip we were invited to bring art supplies for the children (colored pencils, coloring books, crayons, etc). We put our donations in a large plastic bag which the tour manager gave to the director of the “school”. Collette’s sponsorship is so new that we were the first group to tour the facility. We “learned” to do Irish dances (at least we tried—and it was fun) I wish there had been more light in the "dance" area, so pictures would have been better.
and we watched the children play and interact with puppets- all in Gaelic.
We saw the radio station control room and heard some of the Gaelic broadcast. The school began in 1991 with 9 students and now has 600.
We took the high speed Ferry to Strenmaer, Scotland. An amazing vessel—really huge, with all sorts of seating- for eating, for watching out windows, even some where folks lie down and nap.
The ferry had a Burger King, and also had “traditional” food. With my traditional food I was offered “mashy peas”—which looked a lot like guacamole from a distance. The bus was on the lower deck and we went up 2 flights of stairs to get to the observation areas. If a person was really bored, he could spend the 1 hr and 45 min playing slot machines, which on the map were called BANDITS.
Rather appropriate! There were shops and even a nail salon on the ferry
The name of the ship is the STENA VOYAGER.
I was lamenting in the previous posting that I was having trouble finding what I wanted for gifts when I went shopping---I found EXACTLY what I’d been looking for in the shop in the ferry.
At the signal we all made our way back down to the bus and we were in to Scotland. No passport checks, or any sort of immigration.
The flag of Scotland is the flag of St. Andrews—a blue flag with a white cross.
As in Ireland most of the front yards of the houses have daffodils blooming and they are blooming in all the medians of the highway—very pretty.
In Scotland it is the law that we must wear seatbelts on the bus. We spent about 4 hours driving along the coast. Very rugged in places During this entire trip from Dublin, Ireland through to Glasgow, Scotland (where we end the tour) we will have traveled about 950 miles by bus and ferry.
We began driving into a higher elevation and snow began to fall about 4 pm. It flurried off and on until we reached Edinborough.
Tomorrow we will hear a great deal more about William Wallace (Braveheart) and Edward I--- Longshanks
My camera’s battery died, so it is now charging. I’ll probably need to get a new rechargeable battery when we get home.
We ate at a Spanish tapas restaurant tonite. We had about 10-12 appetizers, which ranged from Calamari, to eggplant, to meatballs and tiny chicken wings, to (of course,) potatoes. The serving dishes were placed on the tables and we helped ourselves. An interesting meal, which finished with chocolate chip ice cream.
It was a long day—and when we finally got to the room (about 8pm) we discovered that this hotel does not have wireless internet. I’ll try to download this later. Good night.
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