Today was fuller than yesterday.  After breakfast, Kat picked the four of us up and we headed to her hometown of Comber.  We hooked up with Ben at her house and then headed over to the Patch….a dog training center owned by Ronnie and Laura where the top dog agility show in Northern Ireland was being held this weekend.  The course was set up in an extremely difficult fashion.  It was crazy seeing how the handlers would instruct their dogs through the course, and the dogs who have never seen this course, would make it or break it by the instructions of the handler.  To illustrate, here is a link to a short video of Kat’s dad Ronnie running his dog successfully through the course:  http://youtu.be/-BBLJiRZa90

Doug, Barb, Lynda and I headed out with Kat and Ben in a southerly direction. Our first stop was Down Cathedral and Saint Patrick’s grave.  The cathedral was amazing.

Saint Patrick’s day is celebrated on March 17th but I knew nothing of the man.  He is buried just outside the cathedral with the big stone marking his grave.

After this we headed out to Dundrum Castle, according to Ben one that used to belong to his family.

After seeing Ben’s old bedroom in the castle where he used to sleep as a kid 🙂 we headed further south for Newcastle, a town on the coast of the Irish Sea.  After a late lunch we walked the beach looking for agates and interesting shells.  A stop for ice cream and we headed back to Belfast to stop at Queens University (where Kat studied) and then conclude another wonderful day.