Belfast: Day 4: Game of Thrones Studio Tour

One of the few things we booked before arriving in Belfast was the GoT studio tour.

We caught PT into the city for breakfast first, then jumped onboard the shuttle bus with one other couple… which seemed weird. Was the place going to be almost empty?

The bus ride was about half an hour.

The weather started out fine. Things took a turn for the worse while we were inside.

At the entry there was no sign of life until we spotted a tiny group of people at the door.

We were inside very quickly and it was set up a lot like the Harry Potter studio tour. If you haven’t done it then that description won’t help you!

Basically the entry was a cafe and the gift shop. You go into an antechamber in groups for a quick talk and some footage from the show before going into the displays. It was quite good to be reminded of the main characters and scenes.

The costumes were displayed within the sets. You could get quite close and see the incredible detail.

These are wildling costumes, the people who live in the snow beyond the wall. They have real shells sewn into their clothes.

The costumes were my main area of interest and I think they were probably the best and biggest part of the tour.

The tour also includes a variety of models of sets.

I’d say the place was less than a quarter full which was great for us, we could look at everything immediately. The signs were quite small and the spotlights meant you had to stand right in front of them to read them. Possibly an incentive to pay for the audio guides?

The cafe serves themed cocktails. Red Wedding? I don’t want to remember it, let alone drink it.

They had pictures of the scenes in which the costumes featured next to each piece, which was great, but as Luke observed, they just aren’t as special when they aren’t part of the whole thing. That being said, having done some costume making, I could appreciate the detail and wished I’d been able to see the under layers and fastenings.

These moths are hand made, I remember noticing them on the show as costume decoration.

The scale of some of the props was massive!

I liked the detail in the armoury and the plaques had the story of each significant weapon within the story.

There were several interactive exhibits, including ones where they take your photo and put you in front of a background from the show then try to sell you a print of it. No thanks!

Of course the final room is the eponymous throne, made of a thousand actual swords that were created then moulded into the seat.

Exit through the gift shop! I bought a tea towel, of course.

We waited inside for the bus and it started absolutely bucketing down. We got quite damp just going the few metres to the bus.

We were going to see the GoT tapestry (done in the style of the bayeux tapestry) but the museum was shut, so we caught the glider back to Ballyhackamore at school rush time. We listened to a small boy mock his friends for vaping and telling them how they would get addicted and they denied it. Obviously they hadn’t looked around them, almost all of Belfast vapes constantly.

Luke falls asleep despite the witty banter.

Off the bus we decided to go to a local Thai restaurant and try an Irish delicacy – the spice bag. Not a very glamorous name for a not very glamorous dish.

We ate in so it wasn’t served in a bag or pizza box, but it’s basically a salad of deep fried food. In this case potato, chicken, capsicum, onion and spring onion all coated in a salt, pepper and chilli spice mix and with a massaman dipping sauce.

Apparently this was invented by Irish Chinese restaurants as a snack food. You can get Indian, Thai… I imagine the concept could be applied to any cuisine.

The food was delicious but incredibly salty.

To the pub!

Danny and Peter joined us and so did their friend, Julie-Anne and her one month old baby, who was super cute.

26Jun2023

Belfast: Day 2: Family, Murals, Muddler’s Club, Hardy Bucks!

by Miss Penny Black

When Danny and I were doing the Camino he would have a quick chat to his mum every day and I would be sure to yell hello from the background as I’d met Danny’s mother, Kathryn, years ago… decades ago, actually! So we all met up for brunch at an art gallery in the middle of the city. Somewhat embarrassingly for the rest of us, Kathy was much more fashionably dressed and had also been out filming interviews for a community project while we’d been dragging ourselves out of bed.

Brunch was lovely and the cafe was quiet despite the city being very busy when we got outside.

While in the gallery we went to look at an exhibition of teapots, which I thought I’d send photos of to Charmaine since we’d been to a tea cosy festival last year.

We did not manage to find the teapots but did spend a surprising amount of time in the lift going up and down looking for them. Oh well!

The exhibitions we did find were a bit sparse.

Much better to be out on the streets where Belfast really shines.

Excellent!

Such fantastic diversity in themes and styles and so huge! Many were commissioned as part of a festival.

Being a Saturday afternoon, all of Belfast’s demographics were out in the cathedral quarter.

We walked through a covered market and I bought some hand-painted cards.

I’m very curious about this cheese.

This one reminded me of Lea, who loved sticky toffee pudding but maybe not enough to try it as a cheese flavour.

Peter always describes people who behave wildly as ‘wee hallions’.

More art.

It’s almost everywhere you look and really contributes to the vibrant character of the city.

We popped into The Sunflower for a drink. It has one of the last remaining entry cages from The Troubles.

Nowadays they do pizzas and music and it’s very relaxed.

Yet more art, this one is one of my favourites.

Before going back home, a visit to a fancy cheese shop.

I didn’t mention Freddie yesterday, he is Peter and Danny’s dog and a cockapoo. He is very cuddly and spends almost all his time doing this.

It makes me miss Bonnie even more!

We had a very fancy dinner booked at restaurant called The Muddler’s Club so we got changed then headed back into the city. I had been feeling the hay fever again so I took some tablets, not thinking that one of them acted like a sedative and I was drowsy all evening.

Despite my sleepiness the food was amazing; two entrees, two mains and two desserts with bread and a plate of tiny appetisers.

We had matched wines and they were really well matched, especially the entree that was a scallop with iberico ham in a butter and pea sauce. I think of all the courses, that’s the one I won’t forget.

After dinner we went for a drink in this fancy building.

The drinks were absolutely delicious but they were at the top of the scale, price-wise too. Worth it for the very luxurious atmosphere and they did come with some snacks.

Slightly worried about the end of public transport time, we caught the glider (a bus/tram hybrid) back to Ballyhackamore and had a last couple of drinks at a very buzzing brewery (Bullhouse East) that we had visited the night before.

On returning home we watched a few episodes of a very Trailer Park Boys style show called Hardy Bucks, a show about some complete drop kicks, set in small town Ireland. As you could probably predict, Luke and I understood about one word in ten and none of the Irish in-jokes but found it amusing anyhow.

I was in bed by midnight, Luke, Danny and Peter stayed up chatting about music for several hours.

Tomorrow: wild weather, icecream and magic mushrooms!

26Jun2023

Salzburg to Belfast

by Miss Penny Black

I honestly think Belfast is one of Europe’s most underrated cities. I know I wouldn’t ever have come here without the lure of a friend, but every time I come there’s new things to do, amazing places to eat, new art to see and more.

This is Luke’s first visit and I’m keen to show him why I like it so much.

Belfast is a much smaller city than Melbourne but has an amazing art and music scene that, in some areas, makes it feel a lot like home.

We’re here for a week and a half and plan to visit Derry, go to the Game of Thrones studio tour and eat a lot of good local food. So goodbye Salzburg, maybe one day we’ll come back when it’s cooler and see more of the city.

We had to catch two flights to get from Salzburg to Belfast and flew with Lufthansa. The first flight was delayed but we had a big gap between the two. We had our break at Frankfurt airport, which is huge. So big the staff ride around on bicycles, which I’ve never seen at an airport before.

Fortunately we went to look for our gate with plenty of time to spare as we had to get between terminals and it was nearly a kilometre of moving walkways through a tunnel.

But it wasn’t long before we got to Belfast.

Danny picked us up, he lives less than 10 minutes from the city airport and we were very pleased the weather was cooler.

After going back to the house to pick up Ash and dropping off our bags it was out for dinner at a local place called Duad that had about five tables and a dj playing – so very Belfast.

Then Danny took us on a short walking tour of the local area. Here’s the local library masquerading as a storage facility.

Danny took us to to C.S. Lewis Square, which had this statue below and others of creatures from his books.

I kind of imagined Aslan a bit more imposing than this.

We finished off the night with visits to a couple of bars.

I stopped taking photos and have no idea what time we got home or went to sleep, but it wasn’t too late. We did watch the clip to Kylie Minogue’s new song, ‘Padam Padam’, as Peter is a huge fan and I’d seen people talking about it on TikTok.