A Brief but Titanic Visit to Belfast

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This morning, needless to say, was a bit slow. We dragged ourselves out of our room around lunch time and caught the train to Belfast. Having the train station across the street turned out to be very convenient, and in 2.5 hours we reached the other side of Northern Ireland.

Because it was so late in the day, we didn't have a whole lot of time to do anything, we just wandered around to see what Belfast is all about. Belfast is a very new looking city, due to bombings related to The Troubles and World War II. The city centre was pretty much closed since it was Sunday, and everyone was nursing their hangovers, so we just strolled through and spent a bit of time looking around their city hall.

The big claim to fame of Belfast is that it's where the ill-fated Titanic was designed and built. In fact, since this is the 100th anniversary of the ship's maiden voyage (and sinking), there were lots of preparations for celebrations in April underway. At city hall they were building a new memorial for the Titanic, and a new museum was just being finished up near the dry dock where the titanic was built. The museum unfortunately was slated to open two weeks later, but it sounded cool because it contains artifacts retrieved from the wreckage, and explains the whole Titanic story. I guess you could say the city has Titanic fever.

Mike dragged us on a long walk out to the dry dock and museum to see what we could see, but because of the special events coming up, you couldn't see much. It was neat to think that that amazing vessel was once sitting so close to us. Once it started to rain, we began the walk back towards the train station to catch our train to Derry. We stopped on our way and grabbed some fish and chips for Mike, and curry french fries with peas for Elysia (a British version of our poutine: fries and peas with curry all over it... yum yum!)

We will have to come back another time to get the real Titanic experience, and see more of Belfast, although we're not sure how much more there is to see in the city itself.

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Photos

A Large Hanging Model of the Titanic
This is at the entry to the part of the city known as 'Titanic Quarter'. It is a new development of the dockyards where Titanic was built.

No Wonder the Titanic Sank
Looks like they forgot to plate in the bottom!

'Nomadic'
This boat is the original tender vessel that was stationed at Cherbourg, France. The boat was built by Harland & Wolfe (just like the Titanic) and was intended to ferry passengers from the huge ocean liner to the shore in Cherbourg.

The Harland & Wolfe Crane
When the shipyard shutdown, this monstrous crane was going to be taken down and sold, but a public outcry saved this landmark and it will now stay in Belfast.