What a gorgeous day today filled with sunshine but the air has a bit of a bite to it.
After the lovely buffet breakfast the hotel provides its guests we headed up to Northern Ireland and this small town called Newry. It's apparently where people come to get incredible bargains and as I mentioned in my earlier post my sister can spot a bargain miles away, it's a real gift.
Anyway the drive was very nice and the scenery beautiful. Its funny when you enter Northern Ireland, denoted by the stop to pay a toll, you see a difference if only in the fact that the landscape doesn't seem to be dotted with those quintessentially Irish maze
like stone walls that go up and down hills and across plains. I love those stone walls and look forward to seeing them. I was told years ago on one of my first visits to Ireland that the walls were made centuries ago because the land owners could not process the land and grow their crops due to all the rocks scattered all over the country. Apparently the land owners then began picking up the rocks and to place them somewhere useful and out of the way they began making all these walls. I think the placement of each wall was strategically so that it also made a clear
delineation between an owners land and his/her neighbors. Well, that was a long way of telling you I miss seeing the stone walls up here.
I went to noon mass at Cathedral of Saint Patrick and Saint Colman in Newry. What a charming mass with an angelic children’s choir. When I first entered the church mass was already in process and the church was pretty
much packed. After finding a seat I noticed that the intricate drawings I noticed on all the walls when I entered were in fact floor to ceiling mosaic renderings of saints and other liturgical scenes but also incredible design elements. All the bases of the stained class windows were covered in a shamrock pattern mosaic. It's an incredible church and worth seeing if you ever happen to be driving through the town. The architectural structure of the church is like a miniature version of St. Patrick's in New York.
After the lovely buffet breakfast the hotel provides its guests we headed up to Northern Ireland and this small town called Newry. It's apparently where people come to get incredible bargains and as I mentioned in my earlier post my sister can spot a bargain miles away, it's a real gift.
Anyway the drive was very nice and the scenery beautiful. Its funny when you enter Northern Ireland, denoted by the stop to pay a toll, you see a difference if only in the fact that the landscape doesn't seem to be dotted with those quintessentially Irish maze
like stone walls that go up and down hills and across plains. I love those stone walls and look forward to seeing them. I was told years ago on one of my first visits to Ireland that the walls were made centuries ago because the land owners could not process the land and grow their crops due to all the rocks scattered all over the country. Apparently the land owners then began picking up the rocks and to place them somewhere useful and out of the way they began making all these walls. I think the placement of each wall was strategically so that it also made a clear
delineation between an owners land and his/her neighbors. Well, that was a long way of telling you I miss seeing the stone walls up here.I went to noon mass at Cathedral of Saint Patrick and Saint Colman in Newry. What a charming mass with an angelic children’s choir. When I first entered the church mass was already in process and the church was pretty
much packed. After finding a seat I noticed that the intricate drawings I noticed on all the walls when I entered were in fact floor to ceiling mosaic renderings of saints and other liturgical scenes but also incredible design elements. All the bases of the stained class windows were covered in a shamrock pattern mosaic. It's an incredible church and worth seeing if you ever happen to be driving through the town. The architectural structure of the church is like a miniature version of St. Patrick's in New York.I am currently writing this entry as I sit in the Buttercrane shopping center waiting for my sister and doing more homework. It really seems like the school work never ends. I've been enjoying a yummy lemon cream cake and soda at Costa's cafe (something like a Starbucks.)
It’s been almost 3 hours since I arrived at Costa’s to study so I decided to treat myself to a nice hot chocolate with whipped cream and marshmallows. I know, bad Debra, but sometimes you just need a pick me up.
And as a side note, there may be a recession on at the moment,
but this mall looks like a US mall the week before Christmas. It’s packed with lost of people carrying lots of bags and the café I’m in has just now experienced a lull but for a good two and half hours there was not one moment when there weren’t at least two people standing at the counter. Incredible, really.
All is good and I have no idea what we'll do tonight but perhaps some time back in Dublin city center.
It’s been almost 3 hours since I arrived at Costa’s to study so I decided to treat myself to a nice hot chocolate with whipped cream and marshmallows. I know, bad Debra, but sometimes you just need a pick me up.
And as a side note, there may be a recession on at the moment,
but this mall looks like a US mall the week before Christmas. It’s packed with lost of people carrying lots of bags and the café I’m in has just now experienced a lull but for a good two and half hours there was not one moment when there weren’t at least two people standing at the counter. Incredible, really.All is good and I have no idea what we'll do tonight but perhaps some time back in Dublin city center.
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