Golf Links House Newcastle

Took a drive into Belfast this evening as I've never been before and I was curious to see it. I drive round in some trepidation as the is city has quite a violent past that is still quite vivied in my mind. I feel like I'm running some kind of guantlet by being here.

It was an odd experience in some ways, I would driving past housing areas that look like they've seen better ...

Met my group I am working with this week and within 5 minutes they all knew where I was from and where I was staying and my inside leg measurement (just kidding on that last one :) )

"Ah, so you're at the Dufferin. You'll be knowing Frank then"

Is there anywhere to hide around here?

One of ...

... the plan so far:

Date: 07/01/2010

Location: Buenos Aires

Details: Catch the night bus from Buenos Aires to Puerto Madryn (PM). Dep 15:00, Arr 09:30. £105

Date: 08/01/2010

Location: Puerto Madryn

Details: Get off night bus from BA at 09:30. Spend the day in PM, do an excursion, stay the night

Date: 09/01/2010

Location: Puerto Madryn
Mullavilly, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom conorandalicia

allo le monde
aujourd'hui on a visite la plus veille distillerie au monde. lyly a pris 2 whiskeys
a 11h ce matin ca sa part une journee apres on est partie pour belfast par la cote d'antrim c'etais ...

A quick trip along the coast before returning to the hotel.

A nice little coastline.

I did get caught in a police roadblock. Luckily, I have a UK license. Made it a breeze to get through without many questions. Curious to find out what they were looking for.

... access. I had seen on the internet that Silent Valley was a nice place to visit, so we ended up following road signs to there. The road went inland and took us up closer into the mountains...



When we found Silent Valley we realised it was a bit too late in the day to bother paying ...

... going into the city centre where we had booked our hostel (yes, in hindsight it would have been better to get one on the outskirts), then we encountered the most confusing one-way street system ever. We got into Newcastle at 1500 and out at 1640, getting to Durham at 1700. Finally, we met up with my friend Amanda who lives there and had a nice dinner there before coming back to Newcastle. We were thinking it would be a nice easy trip, go in the way we came out right? no ...

... cup of tea with our tenants (very weird to be going back to our house as guests!). We had a great night, Jo & Ricardo are a lovely couple, and a cup of tea quickly turned into a few bottles of wine and Marshalls Fish & Chips (what a homecoming!!) - we've been thinking of them a few times whilst travelling! We were supposed to be making tea that night so apologies Lorna!! Anyway, the main battle we've been having over the last few days relates to Dave's email account ...

Hi to all blog-hangers-on who have been thus far disappointed with our lack of correspondence since we arrived in the UK. (By the way Zo, thanks for the positive feedback, you're a champ!). Since we arrived last Wednesday we've stayed a few nights with Alex's aunt, uncle and cousin in Fontburn (beautiful English countryside, although quite a long way from everywhere and everything), and are now staying a few nights with his grandparents closer to civilisation ...

... people as possible before we go. Likely dates for our leaving parties (yes we have at least two - one each!) - Newcastle - Sat 10th December (leaving Newcastle around 22nd) - London - Sat 11th January (leaving on 19th for even colder weather than Newcastle - see route!) Hasta La Vista. (Dos Cerevacas, Mi Amigo Paga) PS - Don't ask me why Sunderland shows up on this map and not Newcastle - I've placed the Map pin over the top to obliterate most of it!