Hey everyone,
today me and Toni met our instructors Mr Bavar, Mrs Teichmann and Mrs Neumann in the Arlington Hotel. We had a very nice conversation about our time here in Dublin, the host families and about our currently workplaces. They invited us for a few drinks and gave us some useful tips for our work. The week is nearly over and we have only three weeks left. I will enjoy the next days and weeks and looking forward for new unpredictable impressions.
Yours George
On Sunday Leo, a friend of him and me decided to rent a car and start a trip towards the north of Northern Ireland. There is a long road called A2 a.k.a. Antrim Coast Road which is a pretty fitting term for the views you get. We started our tour at around 12 am in the noon. After taking a nice breakfast at Clements which is a café chain only located in Belfast, we went to Sixt to get the car. It was a well equipped and fuel-efficient KIA. When we started driving down the M2 even as passenger it was a different feeling, because you automatically keep looking for the traffic and stay alerted too. When we arrived in Larne we finally got on the A2. Along the road are many way points where you can stop with your car and take pictures of the great countryside and the ocean. These stops are usually parking lots or third lanes and are well placed. The roads we were driving down are not for nothing so called scenic drives, you can capture great pictures of the awesome surrounding. Luckily the weather was great, it was cloudy but dry and there were many clear spells which underlayed a great lightning to the scenery. We made a few stops in the bigger cities and we were able to see anything from mountains right next to us to forests which we’re similiar to jungles to ports just for yachts. Unfortunately the Bushmills distillery in the far north of Northern Ireland was already closed when we arrived there. They produce a famous whiskey brand which is a symbol of the country (5 – 10 and 20 Pound notes are featuring a drawing of it). It would have been a great souvenir, but probably I will take a ride to there with the bus again and participate on the tour around the factory. The famous landmarks Giants Causeway and the Carrick-a-Rede are also located near Bushmills and as actual destinations of the trip we visited it right after leaving the town. It were unbelievable nice places to be and I think pictures can’t express the beauty of the nature and environment there but at least they can encourage you to visit it also if the chance exists. When we were able to tick those points for ourselves we again hit the road for driving to the last stop of the journey. It was a small town called Castlerock which offers a nice (baltic sea like) beach and a nice promenade. After a long day in the car and so much new impressions we became hungry and had a great dinner in the local „Temple Bar“ which offered a nice Northern Irish steak for a fair price. Saturated and happy to have had such a great experience we started driving back to Belfast (thru an inner-country route this time). – (pictures to follow)
As the title already states I used the last few days to prepare for the NetRiders competition.
So nothing really eventful happens. I didn’t thought the difference between the CCENT NetRiders and CCNA NetRiders would be that big but yeah the CCNA one is definitely way harder than CCENT. Next Tuesday we will see how bad or good I scored finger crossed that its not the last place.
After I attended the NetRiders my Supervisors were supposed to come to visit me but as Martin told me they didn’t have enough time to do so they didn’t come over. So I spend the rest of the day with John he introduced me to the VOIP services KNI offeres. I was supposed to go with him tomorrow on site but I don’t have the Health and safety training I’m not allowed on a ‚construction‘ site.