So today we headed off to Enniskillen in Northern Ireland. For those of you that don't know (and yes there are some surprisingly) Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom but Southern Ireland (the Republic of Ireland) is not, it's a whole separate country. Bert and I live in the Republic.

On the radio last week they talked about how people are travelling "up north" to do their shopping, christmas and general grocery. I decided this sounded like a good idea so thought we should give it a try.

Enniskillen is only a couple of hours away from where we live and interestingly enough my maternal grandmother and all her family are from there so it was an extra special trip for me. belcoo psni 1

We set off around 7.30am and got to Tesco for 10am. We didn't even realise we'd gone across the border until we saw the PSNI station in Belcoo. The PSNI is the Police Service for Northern Ireland. They didn't want to be known as the Northern Ireland Police Service. The PSNI station is incredible. It's like a small prison! It certainly makes you feel unwelcome as you enter the UK but it's a left over from the troubles and as a border station has blast walls and bullet proof glass.

The Tesco store was laid the same as any Tesco store I've been in so we, thankfully, knew which aisles to head for.

Our purpose was to buy birthday, christmas and anniversary gifts and once we'd done that we'd do a bit of grocery shopping.

We had a nice slow walk round Tesco and then over to Asda and then into the Erneside Shopping Centre and by the time we'd finished we'd got a car full of goodies and sore feet.

The trip home took longer than the trip there as we missed two turns and really had no idea where we were going.

We unloaded the car in the rain and then loaded up with the stuff we need for tonight and tomorrow as we're staying with Mr & Mrs Duggan tonight and tomorrow Helen and I are having a baking day.

So there you have my day and I bet you're wondering why we travelled north to do our shopping given that we live in a very beautiful part of Ireland with every shop you could imagine. Well the cost was the issue.

I've already been told how I'm not supporting the Irish economy by doing this and I agree that I'm not but I have my reasons. I'm currently paying a pension levy on my pension contributions in my wages on a pension I will never get. This started in April of this year. In January we got hit with a 1% income charge to try and stabilise the economy and, as we all knew and expected, this failed hence the pension levy. Sadly the pension levy is only for those of is in the public service and in December we're going to get hit by more taxes. In one year my income has gone down by 12% and even though the government tell me that the cost of living has gone down and I can assure them it's not.

Fuel (petrol, diesel and heating oil) has all gone up, milk and butter has all gone up and alcohol has gone up. This list is not exhaustive. The only things I know that have down are house prices (we not buying yet), rental house prices (ours hasn't!) and clothing prices.

Great, so the cost of clothing has gone down but the cost of food has gone up! It's just as well it's that was round so I can afford to buy new clothes as I get thin from not being to afford to eat.

Cowen and his fucking cronies can tell me as much as they want that the cost of living has come down but the people they really need to tell are the shops! Maybe they'll reduce their prices then and prove him right! Until then my taxes think he's a lying cunt, just like the lying leader before him (I'm stating opinion there - mine, no one else's! I'm allowed to state my opinion!)

So once we'd bought all our christmas (and etc) gifts we bought some things from ourselves.

I'd now like to share five items from our shopping trolley.

1 x 250g Kenco Really Smooth Instant coffee.
20 x Tubes of Pringles*.
6 x 900g Tin of Cadbury's Heroes
1 x 1ltr Smirnoff Red Label Vodka
1 x 1ltr Teachers Whiskey.

The coffee cost £2.49, the Pringles were £1 per tube, the Heroes were £5 per tin and the alcohol was £20 for the two (on offer).

In total (just those items) cost us £72.49.

In Tesco Ireland same items have a very different cost!

The coffee is €4.50, the Pringles are €2.49, the Heroes are €12.49, the Vodka is €29.99 and the whisky is €22.49. There is no offer on the alcohol in Tesco Ireland.

That total would have been €181.72.

In sterling that's £162.40. That's a saving of £89.91 which is over €100!

Should we really shop in Tesco Ireland? I think not! This trip will now become a once-a-month spin. Not just for the shopping but so I can find my relatives!

* We bought 20 because they were so cheap!

If you have this blog in an RSS feed reader please go to http://www.iamlanders.com and replace you feed with the blog seen there as in the next few days/weeks post on this server will not be displayed fully and will not allow comments. If you wish to leave a comment not it's probably better on the other site than this one. Thank you for your time. Sorry for any inconvenience.