Chapter 3: Elms and the City of Belfast

To all of my readers, I apologize for the extreme delay in updates. I promise I didn't fall into a hole somewhere, or get kidnapped by a leprechaun. I did, however, manage to catch a pretty nasty illness and get to experience the U.K. healthcare system. Enough random babbling and onto the interesting stuff:

So here in the Village of Elms, we have what is known as the Treehouse (Sadly, it looks nothing like a treehouse). It's basically a smaller version of the SMC... and it has a pub. We don't really venture here often, unless we're meeting up to walk to class. 

Here's an outside view of some of the buildings. Even though we're all in different buidlings, they aren't that far apart.

It's surprisingly easy to get from Elms to the school. It's basically just a straight stretch the entire way, you just have to watch out for cars leaving driveways, and be sure that nothing's coming or that you have permission to cross before crossing streets.

Belfast Tip #3

Drivers are crazy; They will hit you

It's true. I've heard stories of bicyclers being hit by cars. They don't even stop at crosswalks here, unless the sign forces them to stop so you can walk. We walk everywhere, and I mean literally everywhere! It's a rare occurrence when we actually take a cab somewhere. So much for being lazy Americans :)

If you recall from my previous update, I never took a picture of Elmwood Hall (where the Celili was held). Well, here it is.



 Honestly, I thought it was a church at first, at least based on the outside anyway. From what I know, I think the Hall is used for musical acts and such. 

Yes, this castle-looking place is indeed my school. Sadly, I don't have any classes in this building. I just get to walk through it to get to the building that houses all of my classes, except for one. And it's not nearly as awesome-looking. 

Belfast is pretty simple to navigate. Well, at least the area we live in is anyway. If you head straight down from the school, you'll pass quite a few pubs and other eateries on your way into city center. It is about a 20 minute walk, but it's not too difficult.

One of my favorite things about Belfast is this place:

I know what you're thinking: of course it would be a cupcake shop! :)
They sell some of the most amazing cupcakes I have ever eaten! My baked goods are simply sub-par compared to this place. I'll talk about it more when I get to the food blog, but my favorite so far was their Rose Cream cupcake. The icing literally tasted like roses! It wasn't a strong flavor, but had just the right amount so it wasn't too strange or overpowering. 

 


Enough about cupcakes. This is city hall.

I can't tell you much about it, other than it looks pretty and is where riots occur. Riots still occur from time to time due to a vote in December, limiting the number of days that the Union flag flies over city hall. Don't panic, the worst of the rioting occurred in January, and we still have yet to run into or see any of the riots.

During our bus tour of the city, we were taken to see the Parliament buildings. Sadly, this is the only good picture I could get:

Continuing on the trend of important buildings, the next photo I have is of the Crumlin Road Courthouse. It hasn't been in use for years. It was purchased a few years back with the goal of renovating it into a hotel, but it unfortunately became damaged in a fire. The smaller picture on the right is of the prison directly across the street from the courthouse. It too was closed down, but is now used for tours. At night, you can take a ghost tour of the prison, which we're hoping to do sometime. 

So that's what I have on the city of Belfast, or at least the area of the city near us, for the moment. I'm splitting Belfast into a few different sections since I have so many pictures. I'm also going to start getting caught up on my blogs, since I have many more that need written! The good news is that I'll have 3 whole weeks to do nothing soon, so I'll have plenty of time for updates :)