Day 5 Belfast Northern Ireland. Tuesday 3rd July 2012

Our night out on the town was great and I got to experience some of the culture on the streets of Belfast. The U2 song, Belfast Child kept playing in my head as we walked the beautiful old alleyways and streets. Mary lead me down this little alley way and pointed to a sign - Gordon Street.
I was thrilled to be able to walk all the way down Gordon street looking for number 50 which unfortunately has long since been demolished. Edward O'Hagan ran his very successful grocer, tea merchant and wine business at this address from the late 1700's to 1836. Edward was Lord O'Hagan's father so I imagined the young Thomas and his sister Mary running up and down the cobblestones all those years ago. Mary took me to McHughs pub next which was established in 1711 - it's something that we would never see in Australia as our country was only discovered in 1770 almost 60 years AFTER this pub got going! If only the walls could speak of all that they had seen and heard...... Next it was on to The Cloth Ear for dinner - how DID that pub get its name I wonder. We both had a magnificent steak with salad and THE best chips and pepper sauce. Right beside The Cloth Ear was the magnificent Merchant Restaurant which used to be a bank. The entrance was like walking up into some kind of magical palace and given we only had jeans on we could not go inside to check it out further. The bank I work for doesnt look anything like the Merchant and I certainly would have wanted to work for that one with all its GRANDUER! We then walked around the corner to the Duke of Norfolk for a drink where we found two Dunville Whisky Mirrors on the wall and I learned all about the Belfast Baps which I aim to have one today. BAPs are like bread rolls and originated in Belfast during the 1840 famine to help people from starving to death. We left the Duke of Norfolk to see if we could find some places that were on our to do list 1. St Patricks Catholic Church where Edward OHagan was married 2. Belfast Academical Institution where Lord OHagan studied 3. Dunville Whisky Distillery. Found the first 2 but no luck with Dunville as we think it is no longer standing. Whilst we were driving around looking for these places we ended up in a Loyalist part of Belfast and I saw first hand the deep divisions that are sadly still part of Belfast. Because we are Catholics we high tailled it out of this area as fast as we could! I wonder how many more generations it is going to take before Belfast is truly united.
Today its back to the PRONI to meet the research assistant to decipher the old hand written letters we found yesterday and we plan to start reading the 1800's newspapers from the Maghera area for clues......will keep you posted.

This photo is of the Belfast Academical Institution where Lord O'Hagan studied in the 1830's.