The full day visit, which involved 15 community leaders and representatives from local community groups from both traditions, provided an excellent opportunity to view a range of murals from both sides of the community, to learn of their history, the reason for their existence and to gain some appreciation of their importance to their respective communities.

The first visit of the day was to the murals in east Belfast in a very informative and interesting tour organised with the assistance of the East Belfast Historical and Cultural Society and delivered by Michael Copeland MLA.

Michael provided an excellent tour of some of the more famous of the considerable number of murals in the area providing a great insight to history and traditions attached to them, adding significantly to the interest of the group in the visit by interspersing his comments with local, and indeed personal family, anecdotes of the many characters who lived in the area, the hardships they had to endure and their life experiences.

The group then travelled across to the west of the city were they were met by one of the extremely active local community leaders in the area, Jim McCorry, who guided the group along the peace wall, up the Falls Road, past many outstanding murals and into areas of Belfast which were totally new to many.

Again this was another extremely interesting visit lead by someone who had the knowledge of both the area and the people to explain the relevance and history of the various murals visited. One particular aspect of this part of the trip, which was remarked upon, was the visit to some of the splendid and extremely ornate and well-kept memorial gardens along the Falls Road.

In both parts of the city there were a great many murals and other places of interest which could have been visited had time permitted, however those locations and murals visited provided the group with some of the history of the people of Belfast and how it shaped their communities as well as a new appreciation for the role and importance of murals to both communities.

The shelter from the direct and continuous impact of the height of the troubles of living in Ballymoney was not lost on the members of the group nor was the fact that the two very different communities visited may have had very similar traditions and histories yet both lived within close proximity to each other with the same view of Harland and Wolff's famous cranes as their key landmark.

The visit to Stormont which followed then provided participants with an insight into the past and future roles that this historic building has and will continue to play in the politics of Northern Ireland as well as providing clarification on the functions and functioning of local decision making in the province.

Hosted by Cllr. Storey MLA the group first enjoyed lunch in the visitors dining room surrounded by many of the members of the local assembly – faces well known to all but only from the television - before touring the building and debating chambers learning of their significant past and the uniqueness of the political processes operated in them.

Before completing the visit to Stormont Cllr. Storey addressed the group and facilitated a quite lengthy question and answer session which touched on many issues which directly affect both traditions in Ballymoney equally including the lignite issue, unemployment and business levels in the borough and after schools clubs.

At the end of what was a very packed day each of those who participated expressed their appreciation and thanks to not only Ballymoney Borough Council and the CRU for organising and funding the event but more specifically to Michael Copeland, Jim McCorry and Mervyn Storey who made it such an interesting, informative, and as one member said, 'fascinating' day.