April-Travels: A Giant first step

To kick off my Travel-Month of April, the first place on the list:

Belfast, Northern Ireland - County Antrim

Check! Four hours. That's all it took.  Saw the sights, took a walk, ooh'ed and ahh'ed at a massive fish, and found the most awkward way to ask for a table for two.

Indeed, Jeanette and I spent our first day in Belfast on a self-guided four hour tour through the city, stopping at a lot of the major sights and picture worthy spots. But that's not all we did in the great NI, and it took more than four hours.

April 1st, Jeanette and I walked into Lagan Backpackers to a Leprechaun mooning the world and a hyper-friendly receptionist with great burger making skills—free burgers, what could be better?  Our room had a window to heaven and we slept next to some Aussie travelers.  

It was me and Jeanette, ambling through the cloudy city, here and there asking one another,


"Wana go this way?"
"Sure! Why not?" the other would say.

Without much energy from this girl (me, the one who pulled an all-nighter to finish a paper the night before the trip), being a gloomy day in a not-so exciting city, the occasional humor was entertaining.  

We were thankful to the talkative receptionist William who gave us a map of the city with a clear route to see everything we wanted to see, and just followed the winding roads without too much care. It was rather like getting lost for the fun of it, and seeing what we could find on our way back.  

The Crown Bar , a famous place in Belfast, is said to be a great historical place to have a pint in the city--the saloon is about 130 years old.  We walked in and realized how out of place two young, American girls with cameras looked, so we walked out.  It's worth a visit, though, with it's elaborate mosaic tiling and wood style furnishings, surrounded by stained glass. Some booths had their own dividers and little doors! 

Here, on the edge of the river Lagan, we puzzled over a metal statue of a lady holding a ring (in the foreground is a silly lamppost on the bridge). Since we didn't take a guided tour, I did not learn about what this lady symbolizes.  Looking up the facts now, it is called Beacon of Hope (or other funny nicknames mentioned in the link), and represents peace, hope, and thanksgiving.  Looks to me as if she's found some mysterious way to catch fish with a ring in the river...

A little farther down the river, we discovered this HUGE, MASSIVE fish. Well...it wasn't as big as we were told it was. About as tall as me and proportionately as long, the most exciting thing about this fish was it's mosaic scales made up of ceramic tiles with different things printed on each such as newspaper clippings and old photos.  

City Hall! Notice the ribbons on the trees, same as the ones on the fish? It has to do with the continent-wide themed campaign to get people to visit Northern Ireland. I did get the feeling that a few more tourists to this part of the country would do the area some good--we had a lot of the city to ourselves!   

St. Anne's Cathedral, Belfast. A beautiful cathedral, as far as cathedrals go in Ireland! But for some reason (for hope! No really, I'm serious), someone speared the cathedral right in the gut, poking the cathedral right on top with a metal toothpick. For hope! Belfast needs some hope, people! All jokes aside, it was a pretty church.  

Inside, the spire poking through the ceiling...

This photo sums up our wandering walk through Belfast on our first day.  - outside St. Anne's

Day two of April-Travels began with a hearty English breakfast. Note that I said "English" instead of Irish. Northern Ireland definitely defines themselves with the United Kingdom's style and traditions, from the cars to the taxis to the accents (cheerio!), right down to your hot morning breakfast.  An English breakfast consists of beans, eggs, bacon (which is most like america smoked ham), sausage, and toast.  Put potatoes in place of the toast and include brown soda bread with tea or coffee and you've got an Irish breakfast. It's a big difference. Truly, it is.

Giant's Causeway Tour

Of course it took another rolling and windy road bus tour to get us to the...Giant's Causeway! The stone here in hexagonal shapes (with some 4, 5, 7, and 8 sided stones) dates back 60 million years ago. Now that is old! The columns were formed by cooling and shrinking of molten lava and stretch out to sea.  

Legend has it, I'm sitting here on the stones made by the giant Finn MacCool who created the stone formations to challenge his Scottish rival.  Some differently shaped stones have been given names.  All along the coast near here we saw the Giant's boot, Giant's gate, Wishing Chair, Camel, Granny, and the Organ! 

Walking around the Giant's causeway was quite amazing, knowing that what we were walking on has only been seen and explored by humans over a small fraction of the site's life.  The geography of the island of Ireland and NI continued to fascinate me the more I saw.


Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge

Once we got to the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge, the sun came out to play! Just in time to illuminate what was to be my favorite part of our trip to Northern Ireland so far. This is the view looking at the bridge from mainland. From crossing the bridge to exploring the little island Carrick, it was the change of scenery, something different than anything I had experienced before, that made it such a memorable experience.  

While crossing, looking down!

Different forms of bridges have been erected here for the past 350 years, used for salmon fishers to collect their nets.   This is a view from the little island looking back after we crossed!

Our third morning of travel and our last half-day in Belfast, Jeanette and I took a formal tour of the city by a company called the Black Taxi Tours.  The tour was fantastic, despite the bitter wind and harsh rain/sleet that threatened us the entire morning. It took us around the parts of the city we had not been able to touch on our walk.  Even if we had discovered the areas covered by the tour, we would not have been nearly as informed by purely looking at the murals, memorials, and walls.

Our tour guide and taxi.

While driving a handful of people around the trouble spots in Belfast in an old taxi, the tour guide explains the many major events during The Troubles which began and culminated in the 1960s, but has continued since then.  Basically, conflict between Protestant and Catholic communities, and between political parties heightened around the same time as British forces tried to impose their power over this part of Ireland.  Many horrible instances of murder, massacre, and violent discrimination resulted and the evidence of these events is still very much present in the city, including a "Peace" wall that runs through the middle of the city, separating the Catholic side from the Protestant.  
If only I had recorded our tour guide and all the stories he provided...it is a complicated subject, so I recommend taking this tour if Belfast is ever in your travel destinations.

Murals painted along a main street wall depicting the people's fights for rights, for a cause, and against any injustice that befell upon them. 

The Peace Wall to the left behind some apartments on Bombay St where a fire destroyed all the homes. Hand grenades were often thrown over to this Irish Catholic/nationalist side. 

And finally, the other side of the wall above. The Protestant/loyalist side of the Peace Wall, covered in graffiti.  At some points along this wall, there are gates that are closed at 6pm and opened again at 6am, still to this day, banning people from crossing to the other side.  It amazed me, every story he told as he described it moved closer and closer to present day in history...could all that had happened in this area really occurred so recently?!

Belfast, Northern Ireland was the first leg of our trip. From here, we traveled to Scotland! I will write soon on the beautiful city of Edinburgh and how I discovered my liking for haggis. Beware, Belfast was a two day trip...Edinburgh was a five day trip. And this trip alone was the first among four! 

Thanks again to Jeanette for all the great planning she did in preparation for this trip. Couldn't have done it without you, roomie!






P.S. Were you wondering about the mooning leprechaun? I wasn't joking: