what did he say??

on our last full day in enland we went back to colchester to see uncle kit. we left fairly early and had a very long train ride to get there. we finally made it and uncle kit picked us up from the station. from here we went to an awesome pub and had delicious food. there are photos on the flickr i think. we then went into the town of colchester, and walked through this park which was amazing, and all the while uncle kit was telling us about all the things that they did as kids. this usually was kit nearly drowning.. at the edge of the park was the castle. this was the castle that was reigned by queen Bodacea. my mum used to play in there when she was a kid, so that was a pretty cool feeling to think that my mum had been there so long ago. we went into the castle and did a bit of a tour around. it was amazing, i've never seen anything so old.

we carried on into the village and, of course, i found a lolly shop. only they thought it was hilarious we called them lollies. apparantly the correct term is sweeties. ahahahaha. the lady gave me this lolly which is meant to be the sourest lolly in the history of the world. when you go to flickr, you can see that obviously i was too good for the lolly and it didnt affect me at all.. we looked around the town and kit told us lots about granny and grandad and we went and had a coffee at the george hotel which grandad painted. we went to Catchpool road which granny has told me a lot about. she was born here, along with many of the arthey clan. it was very nice to see where granny is from.

i was very sad to say goodbye to uncle kit. we had such a great time with him. i choked back some tears and we got on the train from the journey back.

the next day pretty much consisted of packing and getting everything together. we said goodbye to the wildgeese, which was also quite sad, because we'd had such a great time with them and they had really looked after us like we were part of the family.

we got to belfast late on saturday night. and it was still light! it gets dark at around 10.30 here. cool. we got to the bus station and asked someone for directions:

"hi, im looking for kent street... i have a map..."

"i KNOW where kent street is! what yer doo is ye goo down that street and turn left and then right and then goo THROO the traffic lights - two sets not one - and go to the top of the street and then its a left and a right and a right again."

"oh ok, thanks!"

(walking away) "what did he say??"

we found the hostel and were told we had to go to the other house down the road and around the corner. he started to give us directions but i said we had a map...

the hostel was nice, much nicer than the one in london. on sunday we got up and went out around 10.30. the whole town was dead. there was literally no one around. we found an awesome cafe down a side street and had breakfast and the best coffee since leaving australia. hooray! we finished breakfast around 12 and then went on a quest to find cyprus avenue...

ok, so this was probably one of THE best moments of my life. i know it seems a bit silly, but if someone had said to me, if you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go? i'd always say Cyprus Avenue. for those who don't know, i'm a die hard fan for Van Morrison, and he has written about Cyprus Avenue in countless songs. so we set off to find the avenue, which wasnt too far from the city. we took a bus out there, and walked the rest of the way. when we saw it i was so overwhelmed. i couldnt believe that i was actually on Cyprus Avenue, the place that i had listened about for so long. it was as beautiful as Van had described, and i felt so lucky to be there.

when we got back from cyprus avenue the town centre was buzzing. we then realized it was sunday and nothing opened until the afternoon. go figure. we went on the belfast wheel, seeing as we missed going on the london eye. it went so fast and im scared of heights and jess laughed at me for the whole ride. we saw the whole city though, so that was pretty cool. we caught the train to bangor which is a little seaside village and had fish and chips for dinner.

the next day we went through western belfast and saw all the murals. that was pretty cool. it was such a contrast to eastern belfast - you could see how much poorer this area of the city is. it was really good to see all the memorials for the people that lost their lives because of their religion.

after that we went and saw indiana jones... the second best thing after cyprus avenue in jess' opinion. haha

on tuesday we caught the train from belfast to dublin and then dublin to galway and then had to get to oughterard, 20km north of galway. it took us all day! (happy birthday dad, btw) the hostel is really nice, its just out of oughterard and the grounds are really pretty. its nice to be out of the city. all the people are really nice, but we cant understand anything anyone says. they all talk so fast! we have perfected the art of the smile and nod...

this afternoon we might go to the glengowla mines or just walk around and look at all the pretty hills. its all so pretty.... we're going back to galway on saturday and staying a few nights to check out the music scene..

to be sure, to be sure