Beautiful Northern Ireland!

  Everyone in my family has a bit of wanderlust in them, but my brother, Nate, is the absolute king of travel and he makes the rest of us look like homebodies by comparison!   He had a goal to make it to 100 countries by the time he turned 50, which he accomplished and now he is going back to visit his favorite places and occasionally adding new destinations when it fits into his plans. So when he found out that we were visiting Northern Ireland on our trip (a place he'd never been), he spontaneously  added it onto his itinerary for a trip he was taking at the same time.   Where were the other destinations on his  trip to?   Cape Verde and the Azores in Portugal...you know right on the way to Northern Ireland!   Haha!  

Our overlap with Nate was about a day-and-a-half, so we reserved a spot for him to come along  with us on our day-long tour, which included  stops at Carrickfergus Castle, some Game of Thrones filming sites, and Giant's Causeway. 

You all probably didn't know this about me, but I am a bit of a geology nerd.  I took several geology classes in college and I LOVE visiting places in the world with unique geologic features.   Basically that means that Giant's Causeway was on the very top of my list of all the things to do in Northern Ireland and it did not disappoint.   I was nervous as we approached as it did not look like much from a distance, but up close it was as AMAZING as I had expected!    

Can you believe this place is real?!    😁

I was seriously enamored with this view and in awe at a great God who set into motion the natural processes that created such a masterpiece...

 I think I took more pictures here than at any other single location on this trip...

In case you're wondering how these striking hexagonal basalt columns just naturally formed on the Northern Irish coast, here is an excerpt from the UNESCO Heritage page about Giant's Causeway that can explain it way better than I ever could: 

"The Giant’s Causeway and Causeway Coast is a spectacular area of global geological importance on the sea coast at the edge of the Antrim plateau in Northern Ireland. The most characteristic and unique feature of the site is the exposure of some 40,000 large, regularly shaped polygonal columns of basalt in perfect horizontal sections, forming a pavement. This dramatic sight has inspired legends of giants striding over the sea to Scotland. Celebrated in the arts and in science, it has been a visitor attraction for at least 300 years and has come to be regarded as a symbol for Northern Ireland.

The property’s accessible array of curious geological exposures and polygonal columnar formations formed around 60 million years ago make it a ‘classic locality’ for the study of basaltic volcanism. The features of the Giant’s Causeway and Causeway Coast site and in particular the strata exposed in the cliff faces, have been key to shaping the understanding of the sequences of activity in the Earth’s geological history."

I could have stayed all day, but eventually the tour moved on and we explored  a couple other interesting spots before heading back to Belfast! 

The next day we bid adieu to Nate, who was heading back to Dublin for his flight home and we explored Belfast.  We logged A LOT of steps that day and enjoyed seeing everything we could possibly squeeze in.  

We particularly enjoyed the Titanic Museum {shown below} and were fascinated to learn about the construction of the Titanic, which took place on the museum's site right there on the port in Belfast.   

We thought this street was super cute and we loved the quote arched across the way, "There's only seven types of rain in Belfast:  Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday..."   Thankfully it only rained a little while we were there! 

Northern Ireland ended up being one of our favorite spots on the trip, so I will finish up with a few random facts about Northern Ireland that we learned while we were there:

1. Northern Ireland is a part of the United Kingdom, while Ireland is not.   They use the same currency and same postage as most of the UK (including England, Scotland, and Wales...but not including Ireland).  

2. Though Northern Ireland has its own culture, it does not have its own flag. 

3.  As mentioned above, the Titanic was constructed and launched from Belfast, though it did not pick up any passengers until reaching England/France. 

4. There is still a lot of conflict between Protestants and Roman Catholics.  

5. Game of Thrones was filmed on location in Northern Ireland for almost a decade.  The Northern Irish are very proud of this connection and it ended up being a great boost to their economy.  We've never seen the show before, but didn't have a hard time imagining why it was chosen as the backdrop for a show. 

We stopped by several Game of Thrones filming sites--including Dark Hedges (shown below)--on our Giant's Causeway tour.  

And that's it for Northern Ireland!   Thanks for following along with our adventures...stay tuned for 2 more segments to come!  

Tagging Along on a Work Trip: Lisbon / Sintra

I fell in love with the city of Lisbon when I visited in 2016.   I can't  even fully explain all that endeared me to it, but I left there with a deep desire to return someday.  When Glen's work conference in Barcelona came to fruition, I immediately suggested spending the weekend before the conference in Lisbon, so I could realize my dream of visiting again AND introduce Glen to this beautiful city! 

Here is a little glimpse of our time there....  

MAY 2022

When we were searching for a place to stay, I was drawn to a hotel connected to Sao Jorge Castelo, which is perched right on top of one of the seven hills of Lisbon.  The location was cool and we were enchanted to find that there were peacocks all around the hotel.   

The peacocks weren't quite so enchanting after a couple days of hearing their constant yelps, but we recognized the novelty of them and kept taking pictures anyway. haha

One of the things I felt most passionately about doing while in Portugal, was taking Glen to Sintra.  Sintra is a charming, unique little town full of gorgeous scenery and one of the prettiest castles I've ever seen.   

Getting to Sintra proved to be a little more complicated than we'd hoped for when the tour guide we'd hired came down with COVID and canceled on us last minute.  After some scrambling, we figured out how to take a train to Sintra and then we hired a tuktuk tour guide when we got there.   

We really enjoyed Cristina, our tuktuk driver/ tour guide.  She was very knowledgeable and seemed to enjoy showing us around the interesting and charming spots around Sintra.   We felt like we were getting a lot out of our tour and we we were quite happy with how the day was going...

We enjoyed seeing places and learning about them in ways we never would have been able to do on our own.  

It was a beautiful day and we  enjoyed the tuktuk as a way to get around town!  

Unfortunately, Cristina ended up bailing on us after the castle tour and our new tour guide was rushed and much less personable.   

He did take us along the seashore, where we got to see lovely sights like this, but we didn't learn much about them.  

Oh well, I guess it didn't turn out too badly for everything being thrown together last minute.  We were still enchanted by the town of Sintra....

and surrounding areas....

The rest of the pictures were taken in and around Lisbon....

We went to church at the ward right next to the temple (and dropped off a couple missionary packages while we were there).    Afterward we enjoyed walking around the temple...

It was dedicated in 2019, so we'd never seen it before.   It was as lovely and we were sad that we didn't have time to do a session (since we were only in Lisbon for all of 2 days--one of them being a day the temple was closed).  

Eventually we found some decent gluten free food...

Mostly we just wandered and wandered around Lisbon...

taking in as many sites as we could...

We found another tuktuk and took a little tour around town and saw things we wouldn't have been able to see otherwise...

All in all, it was a great couple days in Portugal and it definitely still has my heart!   

 

WORLD GEOGRAPHY 101: Belgium

So I told you the story about how our WORLD GEOGRAPHY course came to be in the last post.  It was a happy confluence of circumstances which has allowed us the greater ability to travel right now.  But have I ever told you how I got bit by the travel bug in the first place?  

It's two fold. 

First off, I was born into a family with a bit of a competitive nature.  Mostly the competitiveness is saved for board games and sports, but it's also extended into exploring the world. With 29 countries under my belt now, I still am one of the least well-traveled of my siblings.  My brother Nate has been to 74 countries, two of my siblings are at 60+, and two more are at about 50.   I don't think I'll ever catch them and that's okay, but that won't stop me from seeing what I can in my own due time.

Secondly, I have realized that I  have a deep deep love for other cultures and places.  There's just a yearning in me to see and experience the world from different eyes.  Reading books has provided that for me for many years, but there's just nothing that quite replicates experiencing things first hand.   Combining reading and traveling together turns it from just a surface experience to a transformative experience and I feel so blessed that we have been able to allow our children to have some of those transformative experiences!

So this post is all about our time in Belgium.   Our son-in-law, Garrett, had served his mission in the Netherlands and Belgium, so he gave us the scoop at places we should visit and our first stop was ANTWERP! 

We quickly realized after spending time in the Netherlands and Belgium, that the first place to begin our exploring is the Grote Markt of every town.  Grote Markt means "Great Market Square" and I'm not actually sure if every town has a Grote Markt, but it seemed that many of them did, and they tended to be in the cute old part of town.  The Grote Markt of Antwerp was especially charming and we enjoyed exploring there.

It wasn't very busy that day, so Ellie found it to be a perfect place to try out some of her dancing moves...

I have no idea where she gets her flexibility from!  😜

We thought this statue was completely charming! 

Ordering food in a foreign country is often an interesting experience.   We used google translate to figure out most of the food items...

but somehow we missed how large the pizzas were.  😆

After the Grote Markt, we just wandered around and explored Antwerp...

Steen castle was on my list of places I wanted to visit, but, alas, some heavy duty renovations prevented us from getting a better look than this postcard and across-the-street view.

It rained literally every single day of our trip, but the next day started off especially wet!  

Luckily the rain had let up a little by the time we'd trekked to our next destination of Bruges!

With cute gingerbread style houses, cobblestone streets, and picturesque canals, Bruges is a lovely place to visit!   Normally crawling with tourists, we were grateful to be there in the off-season to enjoy the narrow streets with lighter crowds.

We once again enjoyed exploring the Grote Markt of Bruges.

We also visited the Studhuis Museum and walked to the top of the Belfry Tower of Bruges.  

 According to Wikipedia: "The Belfry of Bruges is a medieval bell tower in the centre of Bruges, Belgium. One of the city's most prominent symbols, the belfry formerly housed a treasury and the municipal archives, and served as an observation post for spotting fires and other danger."

  

We discovered that it's also a great place to get some exercise...

and get a fantastic view of the city from the top!

Seriously!   Look at this place! 😍

They also had some fun food being sold at the base of the Belfry.

After that we headed to the Gruuthuis Museum.

We may have been feeling a little silly by then...

After that we drove about 30 miles to the lovely town of Ghent!

One of our first stops was to "Graffiti Street", also known as Werregarenstraat.  I'm normally not a huge graffiti fan, but this place was so cool to visit.   What used to be a boring alleyway connecting two larger streets,  is now an ever shifting kaleidoscope of color and street art.  

Our only regret is that we didn't have any tools (spray paint or sharpies) with which we could add our own contributions to the art.

After that we found some fresh "Noses of Ghent" to try.   What are the Noses of Ghent?  Good question.  Let me enlighten you...

In Dutch, the noses are referred to as "Cuberdon". Here's one of the many stands we saw throughout the city.   Apparently there's quite a competition between the stands.

Here's a close-up...

"Known as cuberdons, neuzekes or 'little noses', these vibrantly-coloured soft-centred candies are said to look like noses and originate from the town of Ghent. Mimicking the jelly bean, they have a hard, thin and crisp outer BUT they house a super-sweet, gooey and sticky centre." Source sbs.com

There was so much fuss about them that we bought them from a couple different places, so we could try them out and see which we liked best.   

Frankly they were all too sweet and, in our opinion, totally over-rated.  We recommend sticking with Belgian chocolate, which we had plenty of and enjoyed immensely! 

Next we visited Gravensteen, a medieval castle dating back to the 1100's! 

And we just enjoyed exploring this beautiful place.

Ghent is one of the oldest cities in all of Belgium...

and the history is rich and interesting. 

 After a long day of exploring, we headed to Brussels, where we were staying for the night.  When we found out that Atomium was on our way to the hotel, we decided that a quick stop there was in order. 

Atomium was built for the 1958 World Expo and is still a sight to behold.

It was especially dazzling when it got a little darker and the lights came on.

We ended up staying at Atomium longer than expected and we were pretty exhausted by the time we got to the hotel that night.  

The next day we explored Brussels.

Brussels is a beautiful place...

but it's much bigger than Bruges and Ghent, so it was a lot of walking!

We thought Mannekin Pis (this small statue of a peeing boy) was hilarious and based on the crowds of people that were there, I'd say that it is one of the more popular draws in Brussels!  We were very surprised to find out that Mannekin Pis was created in the 1600's and has been stolen several times over the years.

Of course, we got  Belgian waffles topped with Belgian chocolate every day we were in Belgium.

We were pretty worn out to start the day...

and we had a long trek from the Brussels International Airport where we needed to return the car to the Brussels Charleroi Airport, where we needed to catch our morning flight. 

We saw a little police "show" along the way.   I have no idea what exactly they were doing or why  they were doing it, but they were entertaining. 

Before we started our long trek from one airport to the other, I made sure to get all of my Belgium postcards into the mail.

I may or may not be a little obsessed with sending postcards.

Stay tuned for Part 3 of this trip!

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