WHIRL2026 Day - 8

Not on the bike today. Today was sightseeing day in Belfast. 

We breakfasted as soon as we could, then made our way to Dunmurry station for the train into Belfast. It's 4 stops. From Belfast Grand Central Station, we walked the Belfast City Hall. In the grounds they have 2 memorials of interest to me, one to the Titanic dead and one for the Royal Irish Fusileers. Photos taken, we popped round the corner and got the G2 bus to the Titanic Quarter and the museum.

Belfast City Hall

I won''t say too much about the Titanic museum, as I don't want to spoil it for any potential future visitors, suffice to say it is very well laid out and takes you through some of Belfast's history before getting embroiled in the Titanic story itself, which all comes to life over four floors. We probably spent a good 90 minutes going round.

I had to, didn't I?

Outside, there is more to see, other ships, where the Titanic and Olympic were laid out and not forgetting the two massive Harland & Wolfe cranes, Samson and Goliath.

Samson or Goliath

Having done the Titanic thing, we took the bus back to city hall, where we took yet another bus a little way up the road. From here we started the mural part of our day, with a brief visit to the Belfast Cathedral thrown in.

Our ultimate goal was to walk the Falls Road and check out all the memorials and murals on show there. I'm not sure what was/had been going on but there was quite a police presence and I even saw two of the white armoured landrovers that the Ulster Constabulary use, that I've only ever seen on the TV before. By the time we'd walked almost the entire length of the Falls Road, it was around 4pm. We jumped on another bus (I should mention we had a travel pass) back to city hall again and then walked back to the station. We had about 50 minutes before the train was due to leave, so we had a toilet break followed by a beer in the Brewdog Bar. The train left dead on time at 5:35pm meaning we were back at the hotel by 6pm.

Not on the Falls Road

The hotel restaurant was rammed again and I was told there was no room at the inn, so we decided to go back to Millies. To our surprise they were doing a sunday menu, giving a choice of 1,2 or 3 courses. We chose 2, main and pudding. I had a turkey dinner and sticky toffee pudding. With that and 2 pints of Carlsberg I'm stuffed.

We're back on the road tomorrow, initially heading east, to the most easterly point, then south, ending the day in the Dublin suburbs.

Till tomorrow.