Belfast and was it?

Assuming your all rested, I shall continue.

Monday August 1 2016.

Slept in. Because we could! Woke to a Bright Sunny warm day! Spoke to Tim the harbour master who showed us how to work the self help pay your fee terminal. Then moved over to a finger pontoon leaving all the seagulls behind. We put the sail covers on and then loaded up some geo caches in the phone and went off to the city centre just up and across the river. Doing geo caching on the way. Got a bunch if you wanted to know. Found the Tourista Office got a bunch of reading material had an expensive not so good coffee and returned to the boat with sore feet, knees and other stuff., there to await our third guest of the summer Margaret (of the Scotland, Toronto Margaret's) who arrived promptly around 7ish or 1900ish for those who use alternate time systems. We then had Beefs Burgundyish for our evening meal.

Tuesday Aug.,2/16 Happy Birthday to my favorite sister Andrea. Breakfast (Cereal, homemade RasinBran for me and something healthy for Sally and Margaret, who by the way is a snorrrrrrrer. Then off to the Titanic. The Centre not the boat as most of you know the boat sank a few years ago after bumping into an Iceberg. We walked to the Centre as it was only about 10 minutes from where we were tied up. Arrived at 1100 and left at the end of the day around 1630! It was fascinating. More about the Ship building and harbour of Belfast and Harlan and Wolf and all of the other ships than the actual Titanic. It also had a ride that took you down and alongside the hull of a ship with the riveters and all that stuff. Sally didn’t scream once! I’m proud of her. We stumbled back to the boat exhausted and Sally made Fish cakes with the rest of the Tory Island Pollock and an Omelet for dinner. After a drink and catchup with Margaret we toddled off to bed.

Wed. Aug. 3/16 0700

 One eye is open! Everything is grey. Should I open the other or close the first occupied me until 0730 then nature caught up and so I got up. Even in port I do the usual, fill the kettle with water from the hand pump in the galley, Something I don’t understand is that Sally and I seem to be the only ones who can make it work. Then I put the kettle on the big burner of the gas cooker, turn and depress the knob on the front of the cooker and then push the little igniter button and woosh the burner is lit and after a little while the water in the kettle boils I then turn off the cooker, lift the kettle off with my left hand, carry it over to the sink, open the top of the stainless steel 10 cup tea pot into which I had already placed a Tetley Tea bag. The holding the tea pot over the sink with my right hand, I pour the boiling water into the tea pot and when full, I replace the kettle onto the big burner and the tea pot onto a smaller burner, Front or back depending on which one if any was in use for something else. I then put the double tea cozy’s (made by my Aunt Ruth many years ago) onto the tea pot and let it steep for 5 minutes. Next I took the milk out of the fridge, got our two cups out of the rack poured the tea added the milk and took one to Sally. Then I repeated the kettle thing and when it re boiled I made a cup of instant Lidol or Aldi coffee for Margaret. Margaret being a coffee not a tea drinker doubled my work load! Then we had a sticky bun breakfast.

Reenergized just like the bunny. We’re off to see the Caroline.

Got there too early so had a breakfast wrap in the pump house bistro while waiting for the ship to open. The pump house is a building that houses the BIG pumps used to drain the dry dock that housed the Titanic, Olympic and the other one during their fitting out. A Very Very big stone lined hole in the ground. You could pay for the pleasure of a walk around in it. We didn’t.

Caroline is the last and only surviving ship that took part in the First World War battle of Jutland. She is a light cruiser armed with 4, 4 inch guns and two 8 inchers plus some torpedoes and 3 nukes. We spent 4 hours doing a self guides tour with the assistance of an Audio guide.

We left the ship did a geo cache then slowly walked back to the Titanic centre and did the Race to the Centre of the world.

This race exhibit was about the race to the South Pole by Scott and Amundsen. Amundsen won. Scott lost and died. Exhibit very good. Especially after having been to Crean’s Pub. We managed to get back to the boat for Soup and Sandwich. A Sandwich in case you didn’t know is named after Lord Sandwich who during the Napoleonic wars or the Crimea war was hungry so slapped some cold meat,cheese, onions and tomato’s into a sliced bun and called it a sub. The wind was getting up so lowered the boom not onto anyones head and removed the Jib sock to reduce the windage. Anyway after that being tired and sore footed we had movie night. Game of thrones part one and two.

Thursday Aug 4/16.

The usual. Then walked into town checking out a couple of geo caches on the way and driving Margaret nuts as an extra bonus. We walked to the bus terminal to check out times for Margaret to get back to Scotland. It was a slow walk as all feet and 4 knees were stiff and sore. Mission accomplished. We went to the Gin Palace for a pint and lunch. Then off to the  tourist office to check out the Game of Thrones coach tours. All sold out until September. Phooooy.  Figured out a hire car was cheaper anyway so we did and made arrangements to pick it up in the morning. Think we did another cache stopped at Lidol for dinner meal (Lasagna) Early night wuppped.

Fri. Aug 5/16. Early up. Usual. Out by 0815 picked up car upgraded 3 times to automatic. I’m the designated driver! Off we go. First stop Bushmill for breakfast wrap. Then to Causway for Margaret. We waited at the top of the hill. And we waited. Eventually she returned and off we went on the Game of thrones self guided driving tour. Lots of fun even Maggie enjoyed herself.

Until,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,1730.

Moved over on road to let bus pass, THUMP, What the? Thumpity thumpity thumpity etc etc etc. Bad words inserted! A flat (on all sides) pulled off on the only flat spot in 23,000 sq. Km (km here instead of mi). Check left side front tire. Yup confirmed flat on all sides. Check for spare. NO SPARE TIRE! Haa an inflator kit! Doesn’t work. Hole in side wall! Insert more bad words. Now what? Car pulls up behind us. Young fella gets out. Looks at Sally who returns the look. What’s going on here? “I know you, I never forget a face” Sally’s turn, “I know you too, and I never forget a face” “Portrush” “Yes” What’s the problem? “You’re the 3^rd car this week I’ve helped here, I know the stone. Your about the 30^th car to hit it this month!” Too shorten the story and to conserve paper, he went home returned with two tires on rims, didn’t fit went home made some phone calls came back. “Know a garage that’s open has the right size tire” Off we go. AAA called just in case. 1 ½ hrs later I’m back wheel and new tire back on and we’re on our way and back on board by 2030. Counting our blessings.

As we/I hadn’t payed the 17.95 all risk insurance fee I was on the hook for the tire. Better than a tow for about 500 Euro or more! Made a deal with rental firm (Enterprise) they payed for the fuel we used so tire cost about 40 EU instead of 100+.

Sat. Aug.6/16. 0815

Up and out to unpark the rental. Margaret negotiated free parking for the night because the machine wouldn’t accept Canadian Credit Card! Whoopie! Off to the market for breakfast and some Geo Caches. Then to the Canadian Sports Bar in the SSE centre in the Titanic area. Pub owned and run by Canadians had a pint of,,,,,,,,,,,,wait for it,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,Canadian!!!!! Lots of Hockey, Baseball and Police parafananial (ha just beat the stuffing out of spell check!) hanging on the wall. Left one of our beat up crossing or Norwegian cruise Canadian flags. Back on board and I did a Roast Beef dinner and finally baked Sally’s Birthday Cake!!!! A short time later I lost all the gained Brownie points!!!

Sunday August 7 2016.

On our way to the Bus terminal. Margaret going back to #2 home in Scotland #1 home being in Linsay Ont and #3 in the beaches or it could be the other way around. Got her to the terminal in good time as we took a cab. Sally and I Geo Cached and walked about until 1500 had lunch and dinner on board and then the 2^nd movie night of the season! We watched About the Us coast Guard rescue of a crew from a broken in half ship. During a Howling Gale outside. Even had the furnace on! Did I mention that I had removed the furnace at the end of last season brought it back to Toronto and had it serviced by my friend Ray Singh of Ray’s Marine. We love our Espar heater!! Then went to bed!

Monday August 8 2016.

Slept in. Just because we could! Did the geo cache at Harland and Wolf and then lunch of soup and buns at the Dock Café.

The Dock Cafe is a café run by 7 denominations of churches. Run on the honour system. You pay what you can into the honour box. Probably everyone pays more than they would in a restaurant just because.

The Geo Cache if anyone is interested? Was out the road that went across the bottom or top depending. Of the H&W yard. Where on could get a good picture of Gargantuan and Goliath.

At around 1400 we decided we’d head up Lough to Carrickfergus to prepare for the jump to Dublin. We got underway at 1430 and had a sail to Carrickfergus. We got tied up on the long pontoon paid our nights fee walked over to the Marina and got some diesel which a nice man put in the back of his car and drove to the YC. We walked back and then went for a walk around the town. We tried to get two caches but couldn’t find either one! Bummer!!. Had an early night in preparation for the run down to Dublin.