back to Scotland again

Posted by: Sean | Posted on: June 9th, 2011 | 0 Comments

First off, apologies for the lack of posts lately, i have no excuse as to why i have not been updating this blog over the last few weeks, but i am hoping to get a bit more time to update it more frequently over the next few weeks. To kick things off i am just going to throw up a quick post. Last weekend i went away on a short trip to Edinburgh, Scotland. I have been there before, this time i was going over to help my friend with some luggage who is moving to Edinburgh. Instead of taking the plane as i would usually, this time it was the ferry. The reason is that since we had a few bags to carry over, they would be too heavy and cost too much to take on a plane, also tickets for a ferry are remarkably cheap compared to a flight. The main difference between the ferry and a plane is that the boat journey in total takes about 10 hours, that includes leaving from my house, driving to Belfast, taking the ferry over to Scotland and then taking a 4 hour bus trip to Edinburgh city as opposed to about a 40 minute flight. I was actually looking forward to taking the ferry, i think the last time i was on a ferry was when i was 8! Up until i was 8 i always travelled by boats, but then planes became the norm each year from then on. It was interesting being back on the boat, its great that you have the freedom of walking around and you have a lot more leg room, a lot more! The ferry takes 3 hours to cross the sea, during those 3 hours, me and my friends just had some breakfast, watched a film in the cinema (the film was Tron Legacy),  and then just went out on deck and walked about. We arrived in Edinburgh city just after lunchtime on Sunday after having a pretty epic 1 and a half hour chess game on the bus. Originally we were due to come back the next day, Monday, but managed to get our tickets changed to Tuesday which gave us a bit more time to enjoy Edinburgh.

A few things we got up to included watching a film, going to a Tapas restaurant which had great food, entering a table quiz where the word appalling would probably be an understatement as to how we done :D but fun none the less and we also went up a sort of mountain, not sure what it was called but gave a great overview of the City. I hope to have a panoramic view up soon, i have lots of photos i took which i hope i can turn into a panoramic view.

The trip home was not as bad as going over i think, the reason was that i had only 1 hour of sleep before going over and on the way back i had a proper sleep so i was not tired in any way once i got home. I really enjoyed the trip and look forward to the next time i head over. Here a some pics of the trip and once i get the panoramic done i might have a few more to throw up!

 

Holidays Over, Work Again

Posted by: Sean | Posted on: July 14th, 2009 | 0 Comments

Well as of today my 2 weeks of summer holidays are over :( . It was great though having those past few weeks off. I just really enjoyed relaxing about the house and not having to get up really early in the morning to go to work.

Now though I have been given a semi good week of hours. I do get this Saturday and Sunday off work so that is great! I never get a full weekend off work and could not believe that I am getting this weekend off :D . Also I have a few early shifts this week, beginning at 7 in the morning. I always hate having work that early and also I like it in a way. First of all I hate the fact that when I go to sleep I know I have to be getting up really early and go to work, so I usually sit there worrying that I will not hear the alarm and end up sleeping in, so in turn that makes me lose sleep and then I usually sleep really lightly so that I will hear the alarm go off.

The reason I actually like having that really early shift is that I will be beginning it at 7 and finishing work at 12! Like who would complain of only having to work for 5 hours! So I get up really early when I usually sleep, and then I finish at noon which is usually the time I get up at in the morning, so I will have the full day to myself to enjoy :D .

During my holiday weeks I went away for 5 days to Edinburgh. That was a great trip, I went with all my friends and we also celebrated two of their birthdays while we were over there. That was the main reason we went anyway. We all booked into a hostel, so that made the accommodation really cheap, it was roughly £50 for the four nights that we booked in. The hostel we stayed in was called the Cowgate Hostel. It was in a really good location, everything you wanted was just a 5 minute walk from the hostel.

Another note on Edinburgh is that drink and food were very reasonable in price, drink worked out at about £2 - £3.50 in most places, but would cost more for more fancy drinks such as cocktails. Cocktails are something that I had never had before and one of the nights we were out we went to a cocktail bar, it was great, we bought them in pitchers that worked out at about £8 so even then drink was still not expensive. When comparing it to home here (Ireland) you were saving a killing :) .

I also went and done a lot of the touristy things such as visiting Edinburgh Dungeons and Mary kings Close, Edinburgh Dungeons was good enough, nothing special, there is also one in London and other places but the one in Edinburgh had a lot more Scottish orientated stories. It was good fun since we went with a large group.

The other place we visited was Mary kings Close, this was basically a bit of a history tour of the real old Edinburgh City Underground, it was really interesting and showed the harsh living conditions of how people lived years ago and how the plague affected them. I would definitely recommend going to see both these locations if you ever go there :D .

On my last day in Edinburgh we decided to go to the airport early so that we would not be rushing. But when we arrived at the airport there was a bloody bomb scare! So everyone had to leave the airport and sit outside for a few hours, our flight ended up being delayed. I thought the experience was good though, the atmosphere seemed to be really good :D

So in the end I thought my 2 weeks of holidays off work were great and I definitely am looking forward to my next week off in September :D .

Summer Break On The Horizon

Posted by: Sean | Posted on: April 22nd, 2009 | 2 Comments

This year at college will soon be coming to an end. There is not much time left now until my exams. I have only 2 weeks left of classes in college now, then i will have a week off for 'Study' then over the following 2 weeks my summer exams will take place.

So in total i only have 5 weeks before my summer break and it will definitely fly by between now and when my exams begin.

This summer i have a fair bit going on, i will be visting England for a while to see my relatives and also will be returing later to Scotland for a trip with a few of my friends. Also i will be working my ass off in my job because once the summer comes the hours i work usually go up a lot, this is great since the only thing that keeps me going is the thought of how much i will be getting paid :D

My online presence will also increase a fair bit this summer with my intentions of focusing on building up on various sites that i am working on. One such site is a .ie site, i havent said much or if not anything about this site yet because i am still waiting on confirmation for the website.

In order to build a .ie website you have to get given permission by the IEDR, basically they do this so they can monitor what content will be available on the irish network of sites, if they do not approve then you cannot have the domain. It is a lot of hassle to get a .ie domain and also expensive, so if all goes to plan and we get the go ahead i will update this blog with what the .ie domain will be about :)