Friday 15th May
Belfast today to meet up with the Wandering Bird group. If you are a regular follower, you may remember that we met up with WB groups in Normandy and Germany last year. The groups are of different people though in Germany we knew three lots of people and this time it’s one couple.
The view from our park up had been of Lough Tay which is one of the most iconic sights in the Wicklow Mountains, widely known as the "Guinness Lake" because it’s dark peaty water and imported white sandy beach resemble a pint of stout. Lough Tay and the surrounding 5,000-acre Luggala Estate were actually owned by the Guinness family from 1937 to 2019. As pretty as the lake and its surroundings are, it is strictly private.
The road we were on is called the Military Road and was built by the British Army between 1800 and 1809. Its primary purpose was to provide military access to the remote glens and peaks where Irish rebels, specifically those involved in the 1798 Rebellion, were hiding out.
Our journey started with single track roads with plenty of passing places. The roads gradually got wider until we finally hit the motorway.
Interesting fact. In Southern Ireland diesel works out about £1.60 a litre and in Northern Ireland it is about £1.74. The cheapest around Hayling Island, before we left, was £1.83.
We arrived at our campsite at Dundonald, just outside Belfast, where we will stay for two nights. Some of the group vans had already arrived and the others showed up during the afternoon, 14 vans in total. As usual with these trips we had a get together/debrief, where we all got to meet each other.
The formal settlement of Dundonald truly began in 1177 when
the Anglo-Norman knight John de Courcy invaded eastern Ulster. To secure his
newly seized territory, he established a network of defensive castles,
Dundonald was one of these. In July
1210, King John of England arrived in Ulster to rein in the independent Norman
lords. During his campaign, the King used the Dundonald fortification as a
temporary royal residence. Historical royal account books show a quirky record
from this visit, noting that King John lost two pence while playing a game of
cards with the Earl of Winchester at the fort!
By the mid-19th century, the village consisted of just a few dozen
houses, a blacksmith, a couple of grocers, a school, and a handful of
publicans. The catalyst that transformed Dundonald from a rural village into a
commuter town was the arrival of the Belfast and County Down Railway line,
which opened a station in Dundonald in May 1850. This connected the village
directly to Belfast, allowing workers to live in the fresh country air of
County Down while commuting to the city’s shipyards and linen mills. The line was eventually closed in 1950. Up until the 1960s, Dundonald was still
relatively small. Its modern population explosion occurred when a local
tenant-farming family, the Robbs, sold over 220 acres of their ancestral
farmland to the Northern Ireland Housing Trust. This land was developed into
the Ballybeen Housing Estate, which grew to become one of the largest housing
estates in Northern Ireland, permanently cementing Dundonald's status as a
major suburb of Belfast.
Saturday 16th May
We had an early start as we were going into Belfast to visit the Titanic museum. It was only a short drive of just over 5 miles and with it being a Saturday (and an early morning Saturday) the traffic was light. The car park was practically empty except for half a dozen motorhomes! We left Rio in Kiwi while we went off to find the group, we hadn't left him in the van for some time, but I had the camera on him and he soon settled down. I was surprised that at 9.30am just how busy the museum was, but there were two cruise ships in, so I guess they swelled the numbers.
The museum started with how linen made Belfast world-famous during the mid-to-late 19th century, a golden era where the city earned the global nickname "Linenopolis." Then the shipyards made the city into one of the most famous industrial cities in the world.
In 1853, an iron merchant named Robert Hickson decided to utilize this new reclaimed land on Queen's Island to start building modern iron ships. However, his business was plagued by management issues and strikes. To save the business, Hickson hired a brilliant, fiercely disciplined 23-year-old English engineer named Edward Harland to be his shipyard manager. Harland turned the yard around completely. By 1858, wanting to be his own boss, Harland bought out Hickson's yard for £5,000. Harland needed financial backing and a sharp business partner, so he teamed up with his assistant manager, a German-born engineer named Gustav Wilhelm Wolff. In 1861, they officially formed Harland & Wolff.
An interesting fact. To build bigger and better ships, the River Lagan had to be straightened. All the millions of tons of mud and muck dredged up from the riverbed was dumped in a pile on the County Down side of the channel. This created a brand-new, man-made landmass called Dargan's Island. After Queen Victoria visited the city in 1849, it was renamed Queen’s Island—the future home of the world's most famous shipyard. By the early 20th century, the little muddy island made of dredged river muck was home to the single largest shipyard in the world.
Construction of the Titanic officially began on March 31st 1909, when her keel was laid down. With the skeleton in place, in 1909 workers began covering it with over 2,000 individual steel plates. These plates were up to 36 feet long and an inch thick, overlapping like fish scales. To hold these plates together, the shipyard relied on rivets—and an incredible amount of manual labour. The Titanic required roughly 3 million rivets, most of which were hammered entirely by hand! On May 31st 1911, an estimated 100,000 spectators gathered along the River Lagan to watch her launch. To get the 26,000-ton steel shell into the water, workers coated the slipway with over 20 tons of tallow, oil, and soap to act as grease. When the triggers were released, the Titanic slid backward into the water in just 62 seconds. Then hundreds of carpenters, decorators, and plumbers moved in to install the opulent woodwork, the famous Grand Staircase, electric elevators, Turkish baths, and the distinct accommodation for First, Second, and Third-class passengers. Titanic was one of the very first ocean liners in history to feature a heated sea water swimming pool (its sister ship, the Olympic, was the absolute first). On April 2nd 1912, the Titanic was finally complete. She underwent successful sea trials in the Belfast Lough before leaving her birthplace for Southampton, ready to embark on her ill-fated maiden voyage just over a week later.
The final part of the museum was all about the collision with the iceberg and the sinking of the Titanic. A few facts about the sinking.
- 1512 lives were lost and 713 were saved.
- 1690 men were on board and only 20% of them were saved.
- 425 women were on board and 74% of them survived.
- Out of the 2225 people on board, 1303 of them were passengers and 38% survived.
- There were 907 crew members on board. Of those, 212 survived and 695 perished.
- This means the crew had a survival rate of just 23.4%.
- Titanic had 20 lifeboats, enough to hold 1178 people. This met and exceeded the safety regulations of the day.
- Given the number of lifeboats on board, 53% should have been saved instead only 32% survived. 472 seats in the lifeboats were unused - one had a capacity of 65 people but was launched with just 12 people on board.
Thomas Hardy wrote the poem "The Convergence of the Twain," in 1912 just a few weeks after the Titanic sank. These two lines were on the wall, and I think perfectly captures the eerie inevitability of the tragedy.
"as the smart ship grew in stature, grace, and hue
in shadowy silent distance grew the iceberg too"
From the Titanic we drove to Stormont Castle to give Rio a run in the grounds as there is a dog exercise area. We were amazed at how big the field is - roughly 11 acres. Rio had a wonderful time.
The main drive up to Stormont Castle was covered in straw bales and we wondered what on earth was going on until we saw a sign which said, "Red Bull Soapbox Race Belfast", which was to take place on Sunday. It made sense then! We got talking to a couple of chaps who were going to take part, and they were rather concerned at the steepness of the course and the jumps that their soapbox was going to have to make! They didn't expect the soapbox to be in one piece at the end!
It was then back to the campsite where I wrote the above, it took me absolutely ages!
One of the group had organised dinner out at a local
restaurant which was a short walk away. We had prebooked our meals which
certainly helped matters as we were quite a large group. I had sizzling
chicken in BBQ sauce which was extremely good.
Sunday 17th May
I’m going to try and steer clear of writing about “The Troubles” as we pass places that people of a certain age will remember from news reports back in the late 60s to 1998, and stick to the earlier history of Ireland, both Northern and Eire.
There is a route called the Causeway Coastal Route which goes from Belfast to Derry/Londonderry. Apparently, it is one of Europe’s greatest road trips, stretching 120 miles. Up to Ballycastle the road mainly hugs the coast with the beach being very close in parts and is really scenic. So off we set, stopping for LPG and fuel before driving to Carrickfergus where there is a lovely old castle. Built in 1177 by the Anglo-Norman knight John de Courcy, it is one of the best-preserved medieval Norman castles in all of Ireland. Standing prominently on the rocky shoreline, it has survived centuries of sieges by the English, Scottish, Irish, and French.
The CCR goes round Larne, passed Glenarm and on to Carnlough where we went under one of the most distinctive architectural features of the Causeway Coastal Route. Built in 1854 by the Marchioness of Londonderry, the bridge was part of a 1 mile mineral tramway which allowed wagons loaded with heavy limestone from the quarries high up in the hills to cross safely over the coastal road and head straight into the harbour. There, the stone was loaded onto ships bound for mainland Britain.
We followed the coast to Cushenden beach where we stopped for lunch and took Rio on the beach - he had a number of zoomies, he just loves the feel of sand under his paws!
On up to Ballycastle where I really wanted to stop but we couldn't find a parking spot - well I did but I didn't see it until we had passed it and Richard wouldn't turn round 😔
