. From there we walked to the city centre and boarded a tour bus so I apologize for the poor quality of a few pictures as they were taken through bus windows, it was closed top as it was raining in the morning. It was fascinating so after a pint of Guinness and a bowl of Irish Stew we walked the Shankhill Road, the Falls Road and the Crumlin Road. I have worked in Berlin when the wall was up, I have been to Nicosia and walked through to the UN protected green zone in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus but nothing prepares you for Belfast. I say that in a nice way, I never take sides or apportion blame but to understand Belfast takes a wiser man than I, at the end of the day we got back in to the cars and drove back to county Antrim but the people that live there have this all day, every day.By the way if anybody is thinking of visiting Ireland, do it, you won't regret it. If you are a fan of Game of Thrones there are nine locations here where it was filmed including our little village of Cushendun.
This is a small section of the peacewall :
This pile of pallets is set up every year to be burnt on the 12th of July (the celebration of the Battle of the Boyne). There used to be tyres too but the pollution was immense as this pile goes to 80' high by that time the tyres were banned, that and the fact it took three days to burn out. Towards the middle of June children live in the pile to stop it from being damaged !
This shop is in Shankhill Road, you know what part of the city you are in for sure :
This corner memorial is to the "5 innocent Protestants murdered"
There are so many walls painted in Belfast, they all have a message :
A memorial note the red, white and blue wreath :
A wall dedicated to the "murdered" Irish MP Bobby Sands :
You know which part of the city you are by looking at the colour of the bollards :
Or the colour of the kerbstones, they'll be red, white and blue or green, white and gold :
Just across the river, the Titanic was built right here :
Another stark reminder of the troubles :
I remember this incident from the TV news, there was a funeral and a gunman ran across past the mourners and started shooting :
This is the Crumlin Road courthouse, closed down in 1996, it was notorious for it's convictions. It's now derelict and you may be able to see the scales of justice have been stolen :
The inside of the Crumlin Road Gaol, there is an underground tunnel leading from the courthouse on the opposite side of the road, now also closed :
The Orange Hall :
Sinn Fein headquarters :
