This Wednesday we participated in the 'Ian Daly Swim A Mile With A Smile' sponsored swim. The swim is in order to raise money for Barretstown Centre for seriously ill children, and St. John's Cancer Ward in Crumlin Children's hospital. We all raised sponsorship money, and on the day of the swim we were taken to the National Aquatic Centre in Dublin, every person aiming to swim a certain number of lengths. A mile is 64 lengths of a 25 metre pool, and I swam a total of 76 lengths!! I was certainly tired afterwards!
I was so delighted to be a part of raising money for such fantastic causes, that do so much good for children who are seriously sick. It was also nice to get the chance to be back in the swimming pool!
On Thursday, all of the Transition Year Irish classes went on a trip to the Pearse Museum - a museum of the Irish school that Pádraig Pearse used to run, St. Enda's. When we arrived, we went straight into the museum and watched a video about the life of Pádraig Pearse. Pearse was an active participant in the 1916 Easter Rising in Ireland, and set up the school as an Irish-speaking school for boys. We then received a tour of the museum, and learned about the lives of Pádraig Pearse, the other teachers and the students themselves.
After this, we took a tour of the grounds and gardens, and were told about all the different trees and plants there. We filmed a few funny videos afterwards, with Ms L, Ms O'C and Ms B, as well as a Class Tabei rendition of Lana Del Rey's 'Summertime Sadness'. It was very funny! :)
So last Monday and Tuesday, my days were spent away from home, in the smallest county in Ireland - County Louth! At 7am on Monday morning, the whole Transition Year group met and got on a bus, before heading off to Carlingford Adventure Centre.
When we arrived at the centre, we headed straight into our first activity: laser combat! I had such good fun playing sniper and 'drop and rolling', and I really enjoyed killing people... is that a bad thing? After having lunch and getting our rooms, we went out again and played some games on the challenge course. That evening, after some time to ourselves, the group was taken out on a night walk in the dark! We played games where we were blindfolded, and to our surprise we ended up being given a scare by some of the instructors!
After very little sleep, we were out again early on Tuesday morning. We tried to complete a maze in the dark, did archery and body zorbing - I had such a good time even though it was wet and cold!
After lunch, we headed out on the water. I had been looking forward to this for days, but when the time came, I didn't really fancy heading out into the Irish sea! After getting into our wetsuits, we headed out onto the sea in kayaks, and made our way over to a giant water trampoline! After this, we went to a cave where we had to stick our heads under a waterfall, which supposedly gives an extra day of life. I would have to say, the water activites may have been my favourite part of the trip! When we arrived back to the centre, unfortunately it was time to go home... so we all piled onto the bus and headed back to Kildare (although nobody really wanted to leave - especially me!) I had such a wonderful time at Carlingford, and I hope that some day I will get to go back again! Hope you're all well, and if any of you are near Louth, you really should take a trip to Carlingford Adventure Centre!! Melissa :)
