It’s been already 2 weeks since my trip, but hopefully I
still remember what I wanted to write 😊.
Well, I wanted to visit Northern Ireland, and the best time
seemed to be before Brexit, whenever that shit happens. I knew the weather
would not be that great, but still it was bloody freezing cold sometimes! I had
4,5 days (Thursday noon til Sunday evening), I stayed 2 nights in Derry, and 2
nights in Belfast. First, I took the bus to Derry, via Dublin airport was the
best route at that time, and I think it took about 7 hours. I’d heard that over
there it is very important if you say Derry or Londonderry, but actually I didn’t
hear anyone say Londonderry, and only in ONE sign I saw it written Londonderry.
Otherwise it was Derry everywhere. Derry is the Irish name, and Londonderry is
UK name. If you know anything about Northern Ireland, you know why it might
matter a lot to some people.
I stayed in Phoenix Bed and Breakfast, what a lovely place
in a good location! A short walk from the city centre (and one very steep
hill), and the owner was SO nice. He was even singing when he was making my
breakfast 😊. The price was also very reasonable, if I
remember correctly, it was 79 £ for 2 nights. I arrived on Thursday evening, so
then I just got something to eat and went to sleep early. Friday I was out all
day exploring the place. In Derry you can feel the history everywhere. Not just
The Troubles, but all history with the walls in the city centre. I went to the
Tower Museum, the tour takes you through the history of Derry and it was very
interesting, and well-presented in chronological order. I highly recommend
that place. Otherwise I walked around, took pictures etc. typical stuff. I
picked a random place for lunch, but as it happens, since it was Women’s Day,
they offered complementary glass of sparkling wine for women that day. Oh well 😊.
I really enjoyed the atmosphere in Derry, it is a small town, and the people
seemed really friendly. Where ever I went, people just started talking to me!
Shocking.
Here's the pictures of Derry. As you can see, the history is
very much present!
On Saturday I took the bus to Belfast. Had a little incident
in that too… Of course, it is me. My Facebook friends already know this story. Well.
Went to the bus station, saw a bus “Belfast”, so I put my bag down and went to
the bus. The driver told me there is a faster bus leaving from the next
platform, so I should take that bus instead. I had checked the timetable and
there were 2 busses, leaving at the same time but arriving at different times.
Ok, so I am in the slower bus, no problem. Went to get the bus ticket because I
still had 15 mins, thought I would just move my bag to the next bus, why bother
going around with my bag when I don’t need to. Right. Good plan. Except there
was a third bus leaving 10 mins before, and that’s exactly where my bag was :D.
I went out with my ticket to see the bus leaving… Took the faster bus, and
arrived to Belfast one hour before my bag. Luckily it was lunch time and I was
hungry, so I had lunch and collected my bag when that bus arrived. Why these
things keep happening to me? You would think I’ve learned something about
travelling already? That night it was snowing a little bit! Haven’t seen that
stuff in a while, so here’s a couple of pics of that 😊.
Ok, that’s enough politics, here’s the pics of Belfast!
This was Belfast bus station, ladies toilet. I laughed so hard.
On Monday I took the bus to Dublin, I had an appointment in
the Finnish embassy for renewing my passport. Now I have a passport issued by
the embassy in Dublin, and I have an ID issued by the embassy in Lisbon. A
friend of mine, former colleague from Lisbon, has just moved to Dublin, so I
met her after that for a snack and a couple of drinks 😊.
Then I took the bus to Limerick, and that was the end of my mini holiday.
Just last weekend I did a day trip to Killarney, but I will
do a separate little post about that. Otherwise this post would be just
freaking long! Hopefully it won’t take 2 weeks to do that.