TLDR – two nights in Belfast for indoor sky driving, pizza, and ninja warrior course
Away we go
Sitting at a Lidl charging the van about 3/4 of the way to Belfast. Sadly the place we rented has on-street parking, which makes charging when we get there a challenge. There’s an Ikea nearby it which appears we can go park at and charge at. The Lidl and Ikea are 20kw slow chargers = 4 hours for a full charge. Kids are calm and entertained in the car. Quiet enough, I stuff AirPods in my ears and listen to Dresden – cold days – on the way
We made it an hour or so early to Belfast. Stopped near the IKEA to add more electrons to the car and eat Burger King. While the family shopped, Chief and I found a nice grassy area to sit and eat. Sitting in the grass, Mila found a bug, lost her appetite, and proceeded to the car, hoping to be bug-free. We met Tim at 40 Downshire Road to tour the house; Class guy. Tim chatted us up a bit before heading off to his BnB. Mixed in with the chats were some food suggestions for later.
After unpacking and picking rooms, we walked to the beach to run chief in the grass, kids in the sand, and play at a playground. On the way home, we stopped at little wing pizza for a pleasant dinner of pizza, salad, and breadsticks. Dinner success – we made it about 45 minutes before the kids started to wiggle enough we left. Making progress. Years ago, we’d have only made 15 minutes. Soon we’ll be able to eat out in comfort with the kids. They all loved the food and wanted to go back again tomorrow. Stop at Centra home for snacks, back home, puzzles, cribbage, then bedtime.
Charging Bla bla – can skip unless you like to nerd
0430 I’m up wide awake; time to head back to the Ikea to charge the car more. The place we’re staying is street parking, meaning we can’t plug in and charge overnight. The closest charger I’ve found nearby is only 7kw. Meaning it will take 3 hours to charge the car fully from where it’s at. Guess I’ll be here charging again tomorrow. While Charging, I start doing math. The Charger is supposed to be 20Kw; why are we only getting 7kw? GIVE ME MORE KWs!! Checking the interwebs it appears the cable only supports 7Kw, and we need to bigger 20Kw cable. On the way to skydiving, we stopped in at a Porsche dealer and bought a fancy 20Kw charge cable that came with fancy Porsche gloves. – Next morning, charging even with the 20Kw cable, we’re only getting 7Kw W T F !!!!
More Thinking and Science – 7Kw is AC charging. DUH!!! the cable is feeding AC power into the car that must change AC to DC – the car must have an Inverter to perform this electron magic. It turns out the car is equipped with only a 7Kw inverter. The best we can charge via AC is 7Kw, no matter what cable we use. On the plus side, we now have a pair of nice 200-euro gloves. DC, we can charge at 50Kw direct into the battery, which is what we did later the next day. Maddex woke up at 0500 with me and came to charge. While we were out walking, we found a Fast DC charger hidden at the Ikea, not shown on the charge maps. Maddex drove the car there, and we added 50% capacity in like 20 minutes.
One of the odd subjects we discussed on our walk was The Ship of Theseus – basically, if you replace all of the parts like for like of anything, be it a boat or person is, the end product the same boat or person. – Maddex figured if you replace too much of a brain with new parts, it’s not you anymore. he was not sure when that happened.
Sky Diving
Near the entrance to the industrial park Vertigo’s in, we passed by a row of about 15 DeLoreans. Figured we would walk back and see them after we parked – sad face they were gone by the time we made it back to check out the car. We checked into the inflatable side of the massive warehouse, where we were told to go to the other side of the building for the sky diving. Plan is for everyone but mom to give indoor skydiving a try. After the quick how to not die video, we suited up and put on eye protection, ear protection, and helmets.
Maddex went first and looked like he knew what he was doing. Balanced on his own, flew nearly to the top of the tube – he was brilliant. The guys working there gave him a high five and told him he was one of the best they’ve seen in a while. I went next and did ok. After me, Roxi noped out and went to sit with mom. Khaleesi said she would do it ! — Khaleesi made it the full two minutes and did a great job flying. Mila was super nervous. She got into the tube, the wind sped up, and she noped out. Proud of her for giving it a try; FUN
After the Skydiving we walked to the other side of the massive building and for an hour of the kid playing inflatable land followed by another hour of Ninja Warrior course. Kids were covered in sweat with wet hair by the time we finished at Vertigo. Back home for more pizza, another puzzle, some Ipad time, VR, a dog walk, and bed. Brilliant busy, exciting day. In the morning, we loaded up and drove home.
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