Emma Visits her 3rd Country

Well, for our last big trip in Ireland we decided to go to Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom. It is a different world in Northern Ireland than in the Republic of Ireland. They use different currency, different measurements, etc. I can't believe that this was Emma's third country (and she is not even 8 months old, it is a shame she won't remember this).




Below are some pictures of Belfast including City Hall, an overhead view of Belfast from Victoria's Square (which is a brand new mall in Belfast) and Albert's Clock.

We took one of the famous political "black taxi" tours. This is a tour where you learn about the political history between the Protestants and the Catholics. The fighting in Northern Ireland only ended 10 years ago, therefore there is still a lot of division between the people.

There are murals on the sides of houses depicting just what the people went through during the fighting. Below is a mural in the Protestant section. It is creepy because no matter where you stand in relation to this mural there is an optical illusion that the gun is pointing at you.

You know when you are in a Protestant section of the country because they fly the Brisitish flag all over.

This is a mural in the Catholic section. In the Catholic section they will display Ireland's colors which are orange, white and green.



Titanic was built in Belfast. We went to the shipyard to see where it was built.

The picture below shows where the Titanic was painted. The picture after that shows how tall the Titanic was in this little stall and how it towered over the building.

We visited the Giants Causeway, which is incredible to see. The ground is formed into mostly hexagonal shapes from ancient volcanic eruptions. Although it is summer here and the hottest month of the year, we still needed our coats because it got rather cold here. This is at the very north of Northern Ireland.







We visited a huge castle called Carrickfergus Castle. We really lucked out with the weather over the weekend because we had very little rain.



Below are pictures of the walled city, Londonderry. The walls are so big that you can walk on them. It was amazing to see. Below, Emma is sitting on a cannon from the 1600s.