Northern Ireland, Trad on the prom, Galway

WOw! So Sorry I haven't been timely on updating this thing! Now that school is in full swing, it seems like I am writing a paper every night! Our last excursion was to Northern Ireland. We left on Wednesday (the 19th) and drove the long drive to Northern Ireland- about 5 hours. Along the way however we stopped in Sligo, and visited the tomb of W.B Yeats. Our literature professor is obsessed with Yeats, and our whole literature class is dedicated to him! We got to our Hostel later that night in Derry which was actually a house! It was so cute and we had the whole place to ourselves. We had dinner at a cute little pub and then finished off the night with some shopping. Northern Ireland is considered part of the United Kingdom, so we had to convert all of our money to Pounds for the weekend- which really sucked because the pound is so terrible right now! (For every dollar in the u.s the pound is about 1.60). On Thursday, we woke up and met Jacqui, our archaeology proffesor and she brought us around Northern Ireland. Jacqui lives in Derry so she has a lot of history behind all of the places she took us to. Being in Northern Ireland was very interesting because there is a long history of fighting between the Catholics and the Protestants. Jacqui showed us the Catholic part of town, but since this conflict still resides today, neglected to show us around the Protestant area. There is even a wall that divides the city in two and marches go on everyday by the Protestants in which they walk through the city singing anti-Catholic songs. Jacqui brought us to the Derry Free Museum which is a museum of all the people that died in the bloody Sunday massacre. Jacqui's brother was 14 at the time of the massacre, and his best friend who was standing right next to him was shot dead! It is crazy to think that this happened just 40 years ago! After visiting the museum, we walked the wall which divides the city, and Jacqui showed us the exact spots that she used to sit in protest. After dinner, we went out in Derry and enjoyed the night life! 
On Friday, we woke up and got back on the bus. We drove to Bushmills distillery and took a tour of the distillary. At the end of the tour, we got a free sample of whiskey- which is not my favorite! We then stopped at Giants causeway which was the spot of a volcanic eruption and all the rocks are shaped like hexagons. It was such a beautiful day and we had fun climbing on all the rocks. We then drove another 5 hours to Belfast where we checked into another hostel. Belfast is another area of Northern Ireland which is in conflict between the Catholics and Protestants, we were advised by our directors and bus driver to not tell anyone that we were a group of students from America studying at a Catholic College as this time we were staying in the Protestant area of town. On Saturday, we got up and took a bus tour of Belfast. It was nice not having to walk around as it seems like all we do is walk! After seeing so many museums throughout the trip (some boring) we went to probably the most exciting museum- TITANIC! Titanic was built in Belfast, and less than a year ago, they opened the Titanic experience museum. I've been looking forward to going to this museum since before the trip and was so excited to finally get there! We walked around the museum for about 2 hours and it was so crazy to visit all the exhibits and read all the accounts of the people who were on the Titanic. At the end of the tour, there was a section dedicated to the movie Titanic, and a guide told us that James Cameron visited the museum just 2 weeks ago to bring the costumes that Jack and Rose wore in the film! On Sunday, we headed back to the park lodge, and it felt so good to be back after such a long excursion!
This past week, we had a free week/weekend and it was so great to have some time to relax! On Thursday we went to a show called Trad on the Prom which was so awesome! It was a combination of traditional dance/singing/and instruments of Ireland. We all got dressed up and went into Galway for the show- it was a great night! 
For our free weekend, a group of us went into Galway. We did a lot of shopping and walked around a lot . It was nice to be in Galway for more than 1 hour at a time and not feel rushed to get groceries like we are every Sunday when we come back from excursions. On Thursday we leave for Dublin for an excursion, and in a week is our fall break! I cant wait for Mitchell and JT to get here and to explore Europe!!!!

Being a Diva at Giants Causeway hehe

The original Costume Rose wore!

Cooking Class with Geraldine : )