Belfast Version 2.0 and the Titanic Experience


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Published: August 16th 2017
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I left Glasgow about 20 minutes later than planned but I put a little buffer in my timing. The forecast was for clear skies the entire route However, I got spit on about 20 minutes outside of Glasgow. The rain was not so bad that I had to stop and change helmets.

Most of the ride was similar to when I was going the opposite direction a week earlier - beautiful. I stopped a couple of times to take pictures of the Scottish West coast. I finally learned the name of the big solitary Island between Scotland and Belfast. It is called Ailsa Craig- which translated means Island of Rock or Rocky Island. It is really an imposing figure, although you would have thought they'd have given it a little more mysterious name! It is noted for mining of Blue hone granite stone which is used to make Curling Stones. It as no population but its peak is over 1,100 ft above sea level.

I arrived exactly 45 minutes before the ferry was scheduled to depart from Cairnryan.

The crossing was calm and clear - it occurred to me that it takes a half hour longer for me to ferry across Lake Michigan on a high speed ferry then it does to get from Scotland to Ireland. The weather was also good on the Northern Ireland side and made my short ride into Belfast from Larne without incident. I tried to book the Hilton where I had stayed a week ago, but they, along with a lot of the Belfast hotels were booked up. The Radisson Blu city centre was available so I booked it. They let me park my bike right out side of Receiption. (Bikers always worry about their bikes overnight. It is nice to know the bike is safe and out of the rain.)

My mission this afternoon was to see if I can find Brendan and Ursula who I had met a week earlier in Belfast. I didn't have either my business card or trip info card with me last week but gave them my cell. I haven't heard from them and guessed the number might have gotten screwed up. Brendan drove cab for 30 years and knew a lot of the cabbies the lined up outside the Europa. I stopped at 5 points first (where I met them) to see if they were creatures of habit. No luck there so I headed over to the Crown across from the Europa. I found two cabbies chatting and asked if they knew Brendan and Ursula. I told them I knew he was a cabbie and the last time I was with him he waived to some of the cabbies over by the Europa. One of the cabbies looked at me and "said -were you with him last week? I said yes. He said "I know him he drives for our cab line." He said that he saw him out and about earlier that day. I gave my cards to the cabby and asked if he would give them to Brendan next time he sees him. He said he'd be happy too! Confident Brendan will eventually get my information I pursued my other tasks. 1.) get a picture of the Crown at the entrance to the "Crown Pub" and a shot of the Europa Hotel - I spoke about both of these in my first Belfast blog but didn't have pic's.

I had about a two mile walk back to my hotel and decided I would try doing a pub crawl back to my room. The first three pubs were next store to each other and I started to doubt both the wisdom and practicality of my decision. However, the 4th was closed and the 5th was a ways down the road. Turned out to be only 7 (6 with the closed one). The walking speed limit in Belfast is 3 Guinness per mile so I was fine ?.

Tomorrow I will be touring Belfast and doing the Titanic experience. My daughter did it when she was here in November and highly recommended it.

As I come up on the end of my trip - it is bitter sweet. It has been a long time out and while I've met many, many nice people and made new friends -I'm looking forward to seeing Karen and my family-my bed- and the gang at AIS (work).

I will also miss the daily challenge of getting from point A to B and all the planning and impromptu decisions involved in a trip like this one. This may sound crazy but in some ways -getting back to work maybe a vacation from the rigors of this trip. That said: it has been everything I'd hoped for and more.

Titanic and last day in Belfast:







After a good breakfast I bought my Hop on Hop off tour ticket from the desk. The tour group has a shuttle pick up at the hotel to take us to the bus route which was a nice convenience. I did the Titanic experience right off and although raining it did not disappoint. I'm a big history buff so knowing I was standing at the spot that the vessel was built was pretty cool. I could go on and on about the exhibit but I would just say- I would put the Titanic on my Belfast visit in the future.







The bus tour of Belfast was shorter than Edinburgh or Glasgow as it is a much smaller city. I enjoyed the tour but found my discussions with locals to be more informative -particularly when it comes to discussions about the "troubled times" aka 1969-1998.



I got off at the Dublin road stop so I could jump on a call at work and because it was close to my hotel. I met a cheeky young man and his buddy at 5 points. I was about to leave 5 points and a fella came over and said overheard me talking about being on a bike so we started to chat - his name was Ian. Ian was a big motorcycle racer back in the day. Ian gave me some Protestant insight into the troubled times as he had lived through them personally. Ian is 4 years older than me and was right in the thick of things at the time. Between Ian -Brendan and others I learned that the issues are still there but it is as if their generation has decided that they want the next generation to have a chance to allow Belfast forge ahead in their own way and have stepped aside. Ian and I shot the S*&t for quite a bit and found him to me a very interesting guy.
Knowing I had my final leg to handle in the morning I headed back to the Radisson after a quick bite to eat. I plan to be on the road tomorrow no later than 10:00 so I have time to stop at the Airport hotel and drop off my gear before shooting down to Celtic rider to return my bike.

I will have two more blogs - My last day in Dublin. Which was pretty cool and a summary blog of the trip. Thank you to all who followed the blog this year and also thanks to those who made donations to Cureduchenne (it's not to late if you are so inclined-- www.cureduchenne.org )

Thanks and God Bless.



Jim

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