22: Northern (north of?) Ireland
Blaire and I woke up at the arse-crack of dawn to fly to London, where we missed a flight to Belfast and got to hang out for a couple hours!
God she’s beautiful
When we finally got to our destination, we caught the end of Winterfell Fest, a Game of Thrones-themed day of fantasy fun at Castle Ward, where Winterfell is filmed. Although we missed the dogs that play the direwolves, we still had a blast exploring the gorgeous grounds, listening to live music, munching on organic local steakburgers & hog dogs, and checking out the stalls/events as they closed down.
Upon preparing to leave, we realized that our lack of car or cell service might be an issue. Luckily Irish people are incredibly kind, and a local family walking around the castle grounds took it upon themselves to find us a ride. One of King Robert’s guards kindly let us hitchhike with him (he does lots of historical reenactments and was actually an extra for multiple seasons of Thrones!). Despite our lack of GPS, he helped us find our bnb, a charming rustic house that may have been haunted.
The next day, we got back to Belfast (thanks to another wonderfully chatty taxi driver, who had lots of opinions about America, Trump, the world… we told him about our hitchhiking escapade, and he responded that in Ireland “you’re never lost if you have a mouth”). Our hostel, Lagan Backpackers, was great and is highly recommended to any friends of the blog.
After grabbing a much-needed breakfast (our B&B was really just a B), we took a “black cab tour” of the city. Basically, a super opinionated driver takes you around and shows you where shit went down during the troubles. Our guide, Patrick, was a fervent Irish nationalist who maintained his own sort of objectivity (he believes the British government has kept its own citizens in the dark through propaganda, and that radical loyalists are outnumbered by decent protestants). I learned from him that we were not in Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom, but rather in the British-occupied north of Ireland. Also, he wouldn’t directly state it, but I’m pretty sure he had been an IRA (or equivalent organization) volunteer. All in all, it was a fascinating experience. Here are some of the awesome murals we saw on the tour:
After the tour, Patrick dropped us off in city center so we could withdraw some Pounds (he doesn’t take credit card, probably because he keeps two ledgers to avoid paying British taxes [he cannot, however, avoid operating in Sterling rather than Euros–ah, the daily inconveniences of 800 years of foreign occupation]). We checked out city hall, an awesome building with basically a whole museum inside, then walked around the city and grabbed dinner. Whatever country Belfast is in, it’s an awesome town.
