Well the weekend just go was a crazy North Ireland experience, or as they would say here there ‘The craic was great’. We had driven from Scotland going via Stirling to see the castle, then we got the ferry across to Belfast from Stranraer. Pretty cool. It was quick so we got into Belfast at about 5:30pm then made our way to Jasons. We spent Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday night staying at Jasons house, about 20 minutes drive from Belfast. Damn we drank some beer. The guy had 6 cases of Tennets in the garage which he had picked up for about 5 pound each, so we obliged and helped him get through most of it. The first day there we had some time off and decided to have a break from all the driving, electing not to go out and get some washing done and catch up on a few things. We went a bit crazy on Friday night and sat up late drinking and carrying on so the next day we where all a bit worse for wear, but we headed out to the Giants Causeway, a natural geological formation right at the northern part of the country. We got home late and had the best intentions to head out into Belfast but never quite made it. Then on out last day there, Sunday, we drove into Belfast and got a tour bus around the city. I got to see some places that I am sure I would have seen on the TV during the 80’s when they where bombed. We even saw Europe's most bombed hotel, The Europa. It had 70 bombs planted in it, of which 33 exploded. It was good to see that the Northern Irish don't have a problem taking the piss out of what they call the 'Troubles', heaps of jokes and craic about the subject.
Monday morning came and we packed up and said goodbye to Jason and made our way south into Ireland, where we now use Euros and suddenly have to pay for road tolls. Last night we spent the night in a hostel in Kilkenny and drank at a pub called ‘The Field’, there where some guys playing some traditional Irish tunes and it was all good craic ! This mornings drive was from Kilkenny to Cork, via a place call Cashel. To get from Kilkenny to Cashel we used a tiny little back road, It was rough and very uneven in some places, and we had to pass many tractors. While in Cashel we went to see a place called ‘The Rock of Cashel’ but the weather was so bad they had closed access to it because it was dangerous. There is a massive low pressure system over the southern part of the UK and Ireland at the moment, this is causing strong winds and unpredictable rain. So for now we are holed up in a hostel where I type this, we may venture out shortly and go to the pub… hmmm that seems to be what people do here….. There are some picture on my picasa page, but I cannot up load the latest ones from here since they seem to have some firewall blockages on may web pages.....
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