Europe 2009

We decided today that the easiest, and may I add safest way to see Belfast and its explosive, violent past, was on a tour, so we did what they call a ‘black cab tour’ and it is just as it sounds. A cab will pick you up, though we had a red one, and it will take you on a tour around the streets of Belfast.

It was an incredibly interesting tour, we learnt so much and it was great to go with a local who could tell you information that you otherwise wouldn’t be able to learn by doing the tour yourself. Our guide Steve was once a soldier here in Belfast so his history and knowledge on the violence and ‘ring leaders’ was quite impressive.

Here in Belfast they seem to idolize the criminals and murderers, leaving plaques and murals in their dedication. Steve was telling us of a criminal called who was a Protestant, and if he heard that one of the Catholics had shot one of his own, he’d not think twice about it, pick up a gun and go shoot an innocent by stander on the catholic side of the street. If someone had their legs broken, he’d go and break an innocent mans, an eye for an eye and all that I guess… The guy eventually got picked up by the police who had some evidence on him but after a high speed chase he ended up in hospital recovering under guard, when the guards changed over he escaped out the window and returned to his beloved loyalist area and knowing that they would just catch him in the end and put him in H block* for life he found some cocaine and on top of the morphine he already had in his system, overdosed. They found him sitting in his lounge room not long after. So, for this the locals on his “side” deemed him worthy of a huge mural and pay tribute to his family every year, taking up offerings and given the proceeds to them. Daft, I know.

There are all sorts of violence that go on here: breaking of arms and legs, shootings and dumping of bodies, ‘jar bombs’ (apparently they make them out of Nescafe jars, are very easy to make and as Steve so calmly pointed out, if were thrown at our cab would blow us all to bits… charming, thanks Steve… I was well on the look out for Nescafe fiends then…) There were hunger strikes for years which saw 10 men die for their cause (that being that the UK government treated them badly…) they stayed in their cell for SIX years, huddled under a blanket and smearing their feces’ all over the walls… Yeah, that was sure showing the government… Not surprisingly they all died in H block. H block for the record is the prison here. It is shaped like a huge letter H, the Catholics are in lock up on one side, the protasents are on the other and the wardens are in the middle to TRY and keep peace. The two rival religious groups once lived across the road from one another, just like you and I, but as the “war” got worse they used to set fire to the houses closest and when they were ruins, scrap it all away, leaving a bigger distance between the two communities, then the other side, not able to let this lie, would do the same, and so on and so on, until now there is more than a km between them. There is a road called “No mans land” which divides the two communities, and NO ONE walks these of a night as you’re picked up, bundled into a car and… well, the rest is left to your imagination. There are actually gates there now that get closed as of 9.30pm, preventing any cars driving down the road. Scary stuff, glad we saw it in day time and with a nice, ex soldier cabbie!
There are murals, there are ‘peace walls’ and there is hope that the world of Belfast will change, and for their sake I hope so too, but I’m not sure when or how this will happen.

Oh, and there was also this really large apartment block, which Steve told us is full of normal every day citizens, it has 20 levels, but the elevator only goes to floor 18 or something (I’d hate to be living on the top floor!) Why only an elevator to the 18th floor I hear you ask, WELL, that’s because on top of this block is an army base, only accessible by helicopter. Soldiers sit up there for 3 weeks or so (if I remember correctly!) and watch the goings on between the two communities; it has a great view for this. When they go off shift, the helicopter comes in once more, picks up, drops off etc. They purposely don’t have any stairs up as if they did so, bombs would be placed up there and set to kill the soldiers, and no one wants to kill a block full of every day citizens apparently and for this reason, haven’t done so yet.

There used to be an Army base

Our tour was very informative and interesting, and for all its violent past, surprisingly fun.

After this bombardment of history we thought we’d best head to the centre of town and do something mindless, like buy a new jumper for Chris who has been foolishly freezing the past few days (he keeps forgetting his jumper or misinterpreting the weather) and after this went to “The crown liquor saloon” which is the oldest pub in Belfast and has survived all the bombings of the past, which is quite amazing as the hotel RIGHT opposite it, is actually in the Guinness book of records as “the most bombed hotel” in the world. There’s a title to be proud of huh?! More surprising then all of that is people actually CONTINUE to stay here, thinking it’s a laugh. Uh uh, not for me! There was an unexploded bomb found in a car here just 6 weeks ago, who knows when the next one will go off, and who knows who or when the hotel might add to its already “impressive” title?! At this bar we met a nice enough local called Sean. He was alright, a proud Belfastian through and through who declared Dublin to be a “shite city” to which, I had to agree to a degree, but then he started to tell us of how he sees the sense in worshiping the sun, and then I tuned out, he lost me there. Still, he was pleasant enough and we had a good long chat to him before parting our ways.

We plan to pick up our hire van tomorrow and head off on our own for a bit and this I’m looking forward too, it’s tiring living with strangers in small rooms. This morning saw an awkward moment between other male room mate (who doesn’t snore) and I. It was early A.M and that sort of dark where you can’t really see that well. I woke up and realized that he and I were facing each other in our beds across the room, my eyes were bleary and I was looking at him thinking “I wonder if non snoring room mate is awake yet?” and then, as if he were a mind reader, he gave me that little “nod” that you give to strangers when you’re saying hello, then I didn’t know if I should give him a nod or say morning, and then I didn’t want him to think I was a giant perv, so I fanged sleep and closed my eyes once more, hoping he believed I was truly asleep. But then I thought “well, what was he doing looking at me?” and then I thought that HE in fact was a big perv, and now tonight I vow to face the wall all night.

Anyhow, washing should almost be done now so best go collect it before someone claims our once dirty now clean clothing as their own. More later!

written by

Chris and Emily on May 26, 2009 from Belfast, United Kingdom

from the travel blog: Europe 2009

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We woke up nice and early today and were filled with a sense of fun, adventure, independence and freedom. Today we were to hire the “Wicked Van” for a week. I’m not sure if you’ve seen these vans before, but basically they’re old vans that are brought and painted over with various forms of graffiti art, turned into camper vans and hired out. We hired ours in Belfast as the Republic of Ireland don’t hire vans out easily, something to do with insurance we were told. The only problem we encounter was the fact that the hire place was soooo far out of Belfast (an hour or so) so, we had the hire man, Dave come and pick us up, which was nice of him, mind you, we had to pay for this. Nothing in the UK is free. The drive out was pretty nice and we chatted to Dave the whole way about this and that, he had a really good irish accent, one of the strongest we have heard so far I (chris is writing this little bit, for a change!) could beraly understand him when we was explaining where to pick us up and stuff over the phone but once we got in the car with him it was a little easier to understand what he was saying and we drove the first part of the “Causeway Coast Road” that Dave informs us is rated as one of the most beautiful raods in the world. It is pretty cool, there are a lot of ruined bridges and buildings by the side of the road that look older than the hills.
We eventually got to the camping ground that was also the home of the Irish contingent of “Wicked Vans” we were issued the “A Team” van, it was black with a red stripe like the van out of the classic 80’s TV show and in case that wasn’t enough reference it was also covered with A-Team logos and cartoons of the charecters. On the back is the slogan “we aint going on a damn plane fool!” the van is kitted out with a kitchen at the back that you access by opening the back door (this also gives you some cover from the rain that WILL be bucketing it down when it’s time to cook, this is Ireland after all) there is a double bed that converts into to benches and a table for daytime use. There is also some outdoor tabes and chairs folded up in the back just in case we see the sun (as if!) We were well impressed with our ‘home’ and took off with a happy smile.

We drove a little way before stopping at the Rope Bridge, which is, just as it sounds. Now I (Em’s taken back over writing, it’s a tag team effort today it would seem!) am not so fond of heights really, and I am really really not a fan of open water spots, so the ocean is definantly not my friend. To get to the rope bridge you must first walk a km, up and down slight rolling hills which is nice, and you get amazing views of the cliffs and the waves crashing against them, causing huge sprays. “Ahhh, lovely” you think to yourself as you stroll along. Then you come to a steep downward slant “no matter” you think “it’s not too bad… til we come back up” but then you see it… A little rope bridge that swings out over a large drop to the ocean. It wouldn’t have been so bad I don’t think if the traffic conductor man hadn’t made us stop for so long as to let others on the other side pass first. It gave me far to long a time to stand and observe the very large drop that was to be IF the rope bridge collapsed, and then I heard the traffic conductor man say “ohno, this bridge doesn’t have any nuts or bolts, it just has special knots” my heart began to race. It was now our turn… bugger bugger bugger! I couldn’t back out now a) we’d paid a decent amount of pounds for this ‘experience’ and b) there was a large queue forming behind us pushing us along. My heart began to pound, I heard waves crashing below us, the shrill sound of seagulls that made it seem as if they were laughing at me and I took a step out, and then went “NO NO NO!” and turned back to the safety of land. I was acting like a big girl. Chris who had gone ahead of me hadn’t heard my large protest and pathetic race back to the safe land. He made it across okay and turned around, expecting to see me behind me but was surprised to see me practically hugging the ground. We stood with the bridge between us doing frantic sign language, he beckoning me over, me frantically shaking my head, but eventually I thought to myself “well, this is bloody ridiculous, just do it already!” So, taking large lungfuls of air, stepped out. I was terrified. I got to the middle and it began to sway and rock with the wind and I almost threw myself down on all fours to crawl across, but I didn’t, I swore instead and began a very fast walk across the remainder of the bridge and threw myself at Chris. I was shaking and my legs were weak, I couldn’t talk, but I had done it. I vowed loudly “I’M NOT DOING THAT AGAIN!!!” but then was hit by the realization that bloody hell, I have to get back now! We looked at the view, we looked at the bird life that was in abundance and we sat and rested. I was congratulated by a stranger for my brave effort of crossing the bridge, he admitted that he was just as bad and that if we went halfs we could hire a chopper to get us off. I contemplated it as did he, but it’d be too expensive we decided. On leaving I psyched myself up for the return and this time, I wasn’t sooo bad, I ran across without stopping or pausing, despite Chris yelling at me to stop for a photo (was he mad?!) I got to the otherside where Chris got a shot of me with a big smile on my face, relieved that I lived to tell the tale!

We then realized the time was getting on, but we decided to take a quick stop at the giants causeway, which, if you’ve seen the tesalated pavement in Tassie, would understand. It’s similar to what we have in Tassie, though it’s more like a stair case here. Impressive, particulary seeing as it goes for a while, but we didn’t stay long.

We thought that we would drive until we found a nice park to stop for a night, but just like the saying “a watched pot never boils” we couldn’t find a silly park to save ourselves! Typical. We drove and drove and drove, it was getting darker and darker and wetter and wetter out. Our mood was not that of glee. We went down roads that claimed “beach” but were bitterly disappointed. We thought that if the Irish have to advertise their beaches there must be SOMETHING there, but there wasn’t!!! No little car park, no turning spot, no nothing, just big barricades between you and the ocean. Typical.

We continued on, hungry, cold, tired and gloomy. For a minute there I contemplated the sanity of our camper van hire, but then I saw it, a beat up little sign saying “port” Well, there must be something at a port right? So, with a sudden left hand turn we found ourselves bouncing along to a nice little spot where we could set up our camp! Hoorah for port!

We pulled over, set up our camp stove, turned the van around for a wind break, set up once more and began to cook our dinner. Then it happened. Car after car turned up, 6 of them, all circling and leaving, stopping, sitting in their cars for a while then zooming off, going right down to the jetty and sitting in their cars some more, eventually there was 6 cars just hanging around a couple of people got out and wandered between the cars having a chat. Em and I (tag! It’s chris again) gathered all this info from covertly sneaking glimpses from our van as we had already drawn all the curtains and we didn’t want them to know that we were watching them watch us! A lot of theories were suggested as to the cause of this strange activity down at this “port” including and not limited too: drug dealing, smuggling, IRA meeting, planning meeting on how to remove unwanted visitors from area but we settled on “lack of a decent pub in the area” as a viable reason and with this and that fact that the majority of the guys and their car being pretty senior we decided it was safe enough to let our utter exhaustion win and we both fell asleep.

written by

Chris and Emily on May 27, 2009 from Donegal, Ireland

from the travel blog: Europe 2009

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a travel blog by Chris and Emily

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