Part 1. Things about the Belfast trip that were great

So as I said in my comment yesterday I'm back from Belfast and we had a great time there.

Belfast surprised me in many respects, some good and some not so good but all in all I'd definitely recommend it.

So what was great about the trip?

Let's begin with the Hotel. I stayed on the south of the city at the Wellington Park Hotel, about 5 minutes drive from the city centre and right next to Queens University Belfast. The Hotel was recommended by a colleague and it was a great recommendation. Highlight of the stay. My 4-year old perusing the wide and varied array of breakfast foods and declaring, as if he owned the hotel, "I want Strawberries for breakfast". I was mortified but the lady behind the counter immediately darted into the kitchen and returned with a huge plate of Strawberries. Needless to say they were duly consumed with the kind of gusto only a hungry 4-year-old can muster. Excellent. The staff simply could not have done more to make our stay more enjoyable so top marks to them.

The concert was fantastic. Let me explain. The place was packed with little kids and a whole variety of parents. You had the enthusiastic parents, my wife and myself for example occasionally bursting into a few bars of "fruit salad, yummy yummy". You had the uninterested parents, those who spent more time looking at their watches than at the stage. Finally you had the outsourced parents, typically grandparents who typically don't know what all the fuss is about and "who the bloody hell are these wigglers anyway". Our boys loved it after a kind of nervous start. A few numbers, a dinosaur ballerina and a psychotic dancing fish and they were quickly into their comfort zone. Great fun but the helium baloon for 6 quid was a bit steep. That aside I think it was worth the trip alone.

We also had an accidental discovery of a really beautiful park on the Malone road. We were driving around with the boys just killing time really and chanced upon this vast park, called the Thomas and Lady Dixon Park. It is apparently famous for its roses and you can see why when you venture inside a little. The boys had a great time wandering about, looking for clues and monsters. That's what 4-hours a day watching Scooby Doo does to a young child's mind.




OK - that's about all I can write for now. More on the good stuff tomorrow.