Today was one of those days where plans changed every few hours. We were supposed to leave our cottages at 10am to head to Stormont and also explore downtown Belfast. I should have known right in the beginning when the bus driver arrived a half hour late that this day was not going to go as planned, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The late arrival didn’t actually affect us too much because we had a very speedy bus driver named Anthony. We got air on a few of the hills he was going so fast.
(Stormont Estate)
Upon arrival in Stormont, we headed to the Stormont Family Fun Day, which was located on the grounds of the Stormont Estate, which is where the Assembly in Northern Ireland is located. We didn’t spend much time on the grounds of the fun day because it was geared completely towards children, and let me tell you, we saw quite a few of them. The way up to the Stormont Estate was quite a hike. It was about a mile total from the gate to the actual building. On the way up, Jenn ended up injuring her knee and ultimately needed to go to the hospital for stitches. While Jenn was at the hospital, we went on a tour of the Stormont Estate and saw where the Assembly meets and where the Senate would meet if Northern Ireland had a Senate. We were given this tour by one of the aldermen in Northern Ireland by the name of Jim. Following our tour, Tim had to leave to meet up with Jenn, so we were left under the care of someone named Elizabeth who works at Stormont Estate. Elizabeth was younger and very fun, so it was great to spend time with her. We went and had lunch and then we met up with Basil, who is an MLA (Member of the Legislative Assembly). Basil then took us up to the balcony of the Stormont Estate. This was awesome because we got to take tons of pictures and no one else from the Family Fun Day was allowed up on the balcony, so we all felt like VIP’s. It wasn’t originally planned, but it was a great use of time!
(Kaitie and me with Basil on the Stormont Estate balcony)
Then, once Jenn returned from the hospital, with 7 new stitches, we headed to Killyleagh (also not originally planned) because Basil had made arrangements while we were eating lunch to go on a sailboat. While driving to Killyleagh, we learned about how Killyleagh was where a man named Hans Sloan was from. Hans Sloan was famous for creating chocolate, but we weren’t there for chocolate, we were there for sailing! When we got to the sea, we met a man named Eddie. Eddie is about 70 years old and he was the man that Basil knew that owned the sailboat. We all got on the boat and went for about a 2.5-hour sailboat ride, drank some wine, and chatted with Eddie and Basil. It was a bit chilly, but we really enjoyed the trip because we got to see a lot of gorgeous houses near the sea.
(View from the sailboat in Killyleagh)
Following the sailboat ride, we returned back to Dundrum and ate dinner on our own and just relaxed for awhile before writing our blogs. For dinner, I ate some leftover salad from yesterday and some instant mashed potatoes. I’m not the biggest fan of mashed potatoes, but I was certainly not a fan of these mashed potatoes. Looks like I’ll be eating a lot of pizza and pasta the rest of the time here when we cook our own meals because at least those are things I know I can eat and enjoy. It’s going to be a bit earlier night tonight. I’ll probably be in bed before 11:30pm because we start our first day of our placements tomorrow. I leave to catch the bus around 8am to give ourselves a little extra time since it’s the first day. A few of us are catching the bus together to the Saint Patrick Centre and then Tim is going to drive us to our respective locations. I’m sure I’ll have interesting things to say about my placement at the Downe Hospital tomorrow. Until tomorrow, goodnight!
No comments:
Post a Comment