Welcome to Northern Ireland!

Well I’m here in Northern Ireland! 

Not going to lie the travel to Northern Ireland was difficult what with a 9 hour flight to London another 1 hour flight to Belfast and then a 1 ½ hour bus ride to Derry, however it was worth it because I’m in Northern Ireland! J The city we’re staying, Derry, is a nice small city, almost everything is within walking distance so we don’t have to worry about transportation too much. 

The Bog (a majority catholic neighborhood) 

Yesterday was our first full day here and it was busy! We had breakfast at 9:00am followed by class from 9:30-1pm. I’m not going to lie, it was a little brutal to have class for that long after sitting for most of the day before hand. I just wanted to get out into the city! After class we had lunch at 1pm and then we had the afternoon free. I went with a few people to the information center to find out about different places to visit and things to do in Derry. After we finished at the information center we went to the Tower Museum which chronicles the history of Derry. It was a very interesting exhibit, but we only made it through the first floor because there was so much information! We got a good student rate on admission so I think we’re planning on going back sometime next week. They had a lot of good information on the Troubles and the partition of Northern Ireland which is very helpful for our class. After the visit to the Museum I went back to the hotel to take a little nap before we went out to dinner. We went to this place called Weatherspoon which is kind of like an Applebee’s, but the food was cheep (only £3.89 for a sandwich and fries) so we will probably be back there a lot because we want to stay cheap. 

After dinner we went back to our room for a little and then headed out to a local pub to listen to some live Irish music. The pub was just what you think an Irish pub should look like and I had a blast! We met a couple guys from Australia and a couple people who live in Derry. I had a really fun time, but I'm a little tired today because we stayed out until 12:30am and since I'm still adjusting to the time change I ended up waking up at 6am this morning. 

The Guild Hall Tower