Belfast, Titanic Museum and Ferry Ride to Scotland!

Our Cosmos Bus Tour of the "Highlights of Ireland and Scotland" last October made its last stop in Ireland in the late afternoon in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Belfast is the principal city and port of Northern Ireland standing on the banks of the River Lagan and connected to the open sea through Belfast Lough and the North Channel It is second to Dublin as the largest city on the island of Ireland. 

Our bus drove around the city so we could see the sights from our windows. I have been fortunate to visit Belfast for an extended period in the past and have written many blog posts about it. The first prior post shows an overview of the city and is on this link.  Another post about a few of Belfast's markets, bars, and a cathedral, can be found on this link.  I also wrote about a tour I took in Belfast that I took that profiled the nationalistic strife that was experienced in Northern Ireland in this post about The Troubles on this link.

As you can see from the photo collages it is a city comprised of both old and modern structures.

We checked into our hotel and then took a walk to find a good pub in which to have dinner.  I felt nostalgic about going to The Crown Bar, as I enjoyed a few meals there in the past.  It is one of the most famous pubs in Belfast and I enjoyed the atmosphere there, but it was very crowded with too long a wait the evening we were there.

Our tour guide had also recommended Robinsons Bars so we headed there instead, where we had a delicious seafood chowder, served with brown bread.

The next morning we had our last taste of the traditional Irish Breakfast! Breakfasts were included in our tour, as well as some dinners, and most of the hotels we stayed at served breakfast as a buffet, and the generous hearty food filled us up all day.

After breakfast, we checked out of the hotel and our tour took us to see The Titanic Museum!  

The last time I was in Belfast the museum was being built in a revitalized area of Belfast which is now called the Titanic Quarter,  I wrote this blog post in the past about The 100th Anniversary of the Titanic, and this blog post is about the famous "Unsinkable Molly Brown," whose home in located in Denver, Colorado.

As you can see in the lower right photo collage above, Titanic Studios are also in the area. This facility has welcomed international productions including ‘'Game of Thrones'’, ‘'Your Highness'’ and ‘'City of Ember.’'

Belfast was the largest and most productive shipyard in the world at one time and the city's main shipbuilders, Harland and Wolff, built the ill-fated RMS Titanic.  Although shipbuilding has been in a steady decline the twin Harland and Wolff yellow shipbuilding gantry cranes are nicknamed "Samson and Goliath," and still dominate the skyline as landmark structures of the city, as you can see in the lower left of the photo collage above.

I am standing in front of  The Titanic Museum!

We explored the main exhibit on the first floor of the museum, but unfortunately, we ran out of time before we could finish viewing the entire collection.  You can see some of the historic photographs in the museum exhibits on this link, and some of the Titanic artifacts in the museum on this link.  

Our bus tour had begun its journey towards the ferry that would take us across the North Channel and into Scotland!

It began to rain while we were on the ferry, but we had comfortable seats inside.

As we approached Scotland it greeted us with a rainbow!

Close-up of the beautiful rainbow.

We returned to our bus, which was also on the ferry, and we saw our first glimpses of the Scottish countryside.

An island far off the southwest coast of Scotland--it may be Ailsa Craig Island?

Our bus was on the way to our first stop in Alloway, Scotland--the birthplace of poet Robert Burns--on my next post.

This was our first visit to Scotland and I was so excited to see it!

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