Saturday 2^nd August                        BELFAST

Another huge, enjoyable day out – Jo’s last full day in Ireland, and our second last. My feet are so sore – we’ve walked the streets of Belfast all day.

This morning, we looked at all the tourist options available, including the hop on, hop off buses, but ended up deciding that we’d just take public transport into the city centre and use that to get wherever we needed to. Investigation showed that apparently, the cost of bus tickets is capped at four pounds per day (you just tap on with your cash card), so that’s pretty good value.

Our unit has a bus stop right outside, so at twenty past 9, we caught the first bus into the city centre, just across from City Hall. They are all double deckers, and we got to sit right at the front on top, so got an excellent view as we went along. We then jumped onto a second bus which had us at the Ulster Museum just as it opened at 10am (nothing in this country opens until 10am!)

                                                    Seen along the way: the City Hall

                                                      The Grand Opera House

                                                  Queen's University

We really enjoyed the museum, which is also an Art Gallery, and spent several hours there looking at the arts, crafts, paintings and historical displays of Northern Ireland’s past. As there was a café there, we were able to have morning tea there as well, and Jo and I also wandered out to see the Botanical Gardens, where the museum is set. It was funny to go into the beautiful old greenhouse (called the Palm House) and see it absolutely full of the types of ferns, succulents and plants we grow at home, most fairly effortlessly! Then, of course, you walk out to their amazing flower gardens absolutely bursting with huge, beautiful flowers that wouldn’t grow for me in a million years….

                                Extremely cool cane dragons on the top floor of the museum

                                         The Palm House, Botanical Gardens, built in 1840

                                                   Inside the main dome

                            Ulster Museum - a combination of the old and the new

Once we’d all finished at the museum, we took a bus back into town to look for some lunch. We found it at The Fountain Lane (on Fountain Lane, unsurprisingly), a real Irish pub. We had a lovely lunch there, but tea, not Guinness to drink! After a brief foray into a great Irish gift shop, we took yet another bus out to the suburb where the murals and memorials are located. This has grown into a huge industry, and the area was thick with walking tour groups, buses driving by, taxi tour groups and walking people like us. Sinn Fein has its office there with a huge mural of Bobby Sands. There were lots of murals about the Troubles, but nearly as many about Palestine. We also saw Nelson Mandela, and a mural about the Tamils, so it’s certainly the area for the oppressed. There’s also a memorial garden dedicated to the ‘martyrs’ of the Troubles. I have to say, though, that I have very mixed feelings about the IRA dead being made into heroes. Two wrongs don’t make a right, and they killed so many innocent children, women and men in their bombing campaign. One of the ‘heroes’ listed was killed when the bomb he was making went off. A certain irony there. As I’ve said, there are very few happy endings inIreland’s history.

                                         Lunch was at the Fountain Lane.

                               Titanic jokes galore!

                                                     Murals

                                                  Memorial Garden

                                                   Sinn Fein offices with Bobby Sands mural

After this excursion into (hopefully) a finished part of Ireland’s story, we took another bus back to the city, and had an hour or so wandering (I headed straight to the Carroll’s Irish Gifts shop, and had a lovely time!) Then Jo and I decided we really needed a sit down and a cuppa before we met up with Lex, so found Parisien, a lovely bar and café. We changed our minds after seeing the menu, and decided on Passionfruit Mocktails instead. Lex came along and had a Guiness, so we had a drink to our last evening together in Ireland.

                                                        When in Belfast......

                                             Parisien, the delightful bar where we had drinks

One more bus of the day (running late, unfortunately) and we were home to our unit. I had a nice lie down and started writing, while Jo and Lex decided to go for walks. Jo made it around the 2km path that circles the lake. I am in awe! We had decided to go out for our last night together, and managed to get a table at Nucci, the Italian restaurant on the next main road over. It was a wonderful meal with a lovely glass of wine each. I have to say, I could write poetry to my Chicken Supreme and Porcini Gnocchi!

                                                                         Yum!

We are now home again, it’s half past nine and still light outside. Tomorrow, we drive to Dublin, drop Jo at the airport for her 3pm flight, give the hire car back, and book into a hotel before getting the ferry back into Wales early on Monday morning. Sadly, it will soon be goodbye, Ireland.