NorthDownMuse

A feast of festivals

I've been so busy house hunting and gyming since I've been here that I've ignored the growing stack of colorful booklets and brochures promoting "What's On." Monday I sat down and read through the Festival of Fools brochure (comedy festival)

Bernard MacLaverty

The first book I read when I got here was Ireland in Mind, a collection of essays and short stories either by writers who visited Ireland or by Irish ex-pats. Most are household names (Virginia Woolf, Oscar Wilde, Frank McCourt). Of the 32 featured, I circled four that spoke to

May Day!

We live near Holywood, home to Rory McIlroy and to Ireland's only surviving maypole. From Wikipedia: "According to local folklore it dates from 1700, when a Dutch ship is said to have run aground on the shore nearby, and the crew erected the broken mast to show

Giro-mania

Giro d'Italia is the lesser-known cousin of the Tour de France. Both have pre-race trials in other countries, I assume to generate interest in the big event. Giro is having its Big Start [http://www.girostart2014.com/] in Belfast this year. If you scroll through the photos on

Back to Belfast

When I was a teenager, I spent summers in the U.S., mostly at the beach visiting my grandparents in New Jersey and Florida. When I flew back to Belfast every August, it was invariably rainy and gray. But the weather was fine when we arrived Saturday, easing my fears

Sagres: More than a beer

When you send David grocery shopping, this is what you get: I'm not complaining, mind you. Note the Sagres beer on the left. It's the most common beer in Portugal and shares its name with a town on the southwest tip of the Algarve. If you

Down day

We walked a lot every day so Thursday we decided was a good lounge-by-the-pool day. Here's a photo of David chillin and of one of the gardens at the villa. Most of our fellow guests at the villa were French or German. On the kayak trip, everyone was

Nothing to Luz

We walked several miles along the cliffs to Luz then took a bus back to Lagos. I have 20 photos from this day, all stunning. It takes a while to load each one, so here's a sprinkling. At one point, the cliff trail is washed out, so you

Moor to see in Silves

Our villa was near the Ponta da Piedade, which a tourist website tells me is "possibly the most beautiful natural feature of the Algarve coastline. The shoreline is formed of heavily weathered cliffs that have been carved into rock pillars, natural tunnels and hidden grottos. The sandstone cliffs of

Loving Lagos

One more dessert picture before kayak photos: Kayaking is definitely the way to explore the caves and grotttoes and inaccessible beaches. Kissing rock: We had to do some tricky steering. People who go to the beach in Lagos are in pretty good shape: Our guide Claudio talks to a snorkel

Picture perfect birthday

The trip to Portugal was awesome. I am truly lucky to be married to someone who is a frustrated travel agent. And the great thing is it was cheap. Roundtrip airfare, a week at a hotel including breakfast, and transfer service from the airport to our hotel (an hour'

Happy Bday 2 Me

Fastest blog post ever: need to leave in 2 minutes to catch a flight to Portugal for a week to celebrate my birthday. One of Belfast region's charms: cheap flights. :-)

Putting energy to good use

One of the awesome things about house hunting here is the energy performance certificate available for each house on the market. It's a seven-page standardized document that looks at the house's current energy use and carbon dioxide emissions and how those might decrease if a list

House hunter, part 2

I have now looked at 13 houses. There are four that I really like, each with pros and cons. David's been to see one and will visit another tonight and a third tomorrow. Then we will need to make an offer. It's interesting that three of

Morning walk

A recent morning's walk from Carnalea to Crawfordsburn. 4/23

Video angst

When I worked out at the Y (on treadmill or bike), my choices were to watch Fox news, sports, or a cooking show where people made food that no one who ever saw the inside of a gym was likely to eat. I would not choose to watch any of

Donegal, part two

So Glenveagh Castle was built in 1870-73 by a particularly nasty Ulster Scot, a Mr. Adair, who made his fortune on land speculation in the U.S. before returning and buying up vast tracts of Donegal. He evicted 44 tenant families--244 people--to improve the aesthetics of his deer hunting grounds.

A Day in Donegal

When I was 18, I hitched the whole way around Ireland, staying in youth hostels. One of my favorite places was County Donegal, the most northerly county in Ulster despite not being in Northern Ireland. David and I went there yesterday and it was as gorgeous as I recalled. While

Botanic gardens

I went into Belfast yesterday to visit the Linen Hall Library [https://www.linenhall.com/], followed by dinner with David and a film at Queens University (The Lunchbox--highly recommended). Before the film, we visited the Botanic Gardens, where college students juggle, play music, and enjoy being young. The smell from

5+5 continued

And now 5 random things I like about living here. 1. Ulster accents 2. The way everyone says something to you as you pass on the trail. Example: "It'll not be long now 'til the rain comes." It never did rain yesterday, but that'

5 plus, 5 minus

Every now and again I'm going to play a game in which, very quickly, I come up with five things I don't like about living here and five things I do. These are the first things that come to mind. Here goes: Don't like:

House hunters international

On a hill rising above the coastal path is the Downton Abbyesque Crawfordsburn House [http://www.ipestates.co.uk/2-crawford-house-crawfordsburn/234923], once home to the Wilson family (you may have heard of their golf balls?). During the war, it became a hospital, then a nursing home, then it was divided

Run for your life!

I think I started running when I was 10 years old, nicely serving my competitive spirit. I did 5Ks, 10Ks, a few sprint triathlons. In 2008, I was ready for the big dog--an Olympic triathlon in Philadelphia (0.93 mile swim; 24.8 mile bike, and 6.2 mile run)

Starbucks

We made our first trip to an Ulster Starbucks, popping in at the one in Bangor after working out Saturday morning. There's a lot of "popping" here. For instance, when I joined Aurora, the membership person said she would pop my membership off when I left

Bumming around Belfast

After getting our veg on at St. George's market, we wandered around the Cathedral Quarter in Belfast. The choir was rehearsing in St. Anne's Cathedral [http://static.panoramio.com/photos/large/19163750.jpg], which made the experience exquisite. While the cathedral is lovely, the thing that