Ireland, Day 2 - Titanic!

Today was my day. Mom paid for us all to go on a Titanic tour of Belfast. There is one that is run by the great granddaughter of one of the workers who went down on the ship, Tommy Millar. You may have heard the story of the man who gave each of his sons two pennies before he left, and told the boys not to spend them until he got home. Well, he never came home, and the boys never spent the pennies. Susie (Tommy's great granddaughter and the lady that runs the tour) usually has them, but they're on loan to the Titanic exhibit in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee right now. But, we did get to see some of the tools that were used.

As well as one of the pieces of wood that were used as time cards at the Harland and Wolff shipyard (the shipyard that built the Titanic). Each one had a number, and those numbers were how they kept track of the workers.

Our first stop was Thomas Andrew's house. Thomas Andrews is the man who designed the Titanic. His home is now the HQ of the Northern Ireland Football Association, and they've kept parts of it the same as it was back in Andrews' time.

I like Belfast

Our next stop was the Titanic Memorial in front of the City Hall. It was refurbished back in April (for the 100th anniversary of the sinking on the 15th), and a new plaque was added with the names of all the people who died on the ship.

We then went to the Titanica exhibit. There are very few artifacts from Titanic in Belfast, and they are at this exhibit.

Most of the items in the exhibit are from other ships that were similar to Titanic.

White Star (the company that owned Titanic) had souvenirs on board for people to buy, so they wouldn't take the towels & dishes

Plans

They had an excellent representation of how many people died vs how many were saved from each category of people on board

The number of First Class passengers who were saved (top, 199) and lost (bottom, 120)

Second Class saved (117) and lost (155)

Third Class saved (172) and lost (537)

Crew saved ( 215) and lost (703)

We got to see the dishes from 3rd class

As well as the dishes for 1st and 2nd

We also got to see that they had Kosher dishes

There was a display of some Titanic-themed souvenirs available throughout the years. My favorite was the Gin & Titonic set, which made ship & iceberg shaped ice cubes.

Then, we went to the shipyard. Normally, the tour goes inside the Drawing Offices, where Titanic was designed, but there was a partial roof collapse on another part of the building, so it's closed. But, we got to see the outside and look in a window.

They are the white building on the left

The actual dock where the Titanic and her sister Ship, Olympic, were built has been filled in, but they've done neat things to it. They've made the outlines of both ships on the ground, so you can see where they stood. Max & I played Kate & Leo on the outline of Titanic. It was too windy and cold to go all the way down to the end, though.

We went and saw the Nomadic, which was Titanic's little sister. She was built as a  mini-Titanic, and was used to shuttle the 1st and 2nd class passengers to Titanic. She's undergoing refurbishment right now, though, so we couldn't go in.

The tour was then over. We ended right next to the brand new, fancy-schmancy Titanic museum (not the one we had been to earlier), so we went in there for lunch. There's noting else down that way to eat. The cafe was actually pretty darn yummy and reasonably priced, so that was a nice surprise. Em didn't care one whit to see the Titanic museum, so she walked back to the hotel. It wasn't far. Max & I stayed at the museum.

Titanic Belfast (the museum) is a high-tech sort of place. Very showy and Hollywood-y, but I still really enjoyed it. They had a nice history of Belfast, as well as of Titanic herself. We got to see recreations of cabins, as well as lots of samples of things used on the ship - fabrics, carpets, moldings, dishes, etc.

A first class room

A second class room

Carpet Samples

Moldings

Fabric Samples

The exhibit follows Titanic from design to build to launch to sinking. We then follow along to the archaeological site through movies and interactive touchscreen computers.

Actual messages sent between Titanic and other ships

You stood on a giant glass floor, which had a screen under it showing the wreck

Finally, they have the inquiries into the sinking, as well as myths, legends, and media about Titanic.

The inquest section, with a video screen over a full-size replica of one of the lifeboats

It was a lot of fun.

Costumes and props from 1997's Titanic

We saw another rainbow

By then, it was nice and sunny, so Max & I walked to the end of the slipway where Titanic had been built. Her bow was almost up to the big Titanic Belfast building you see there, and we're standing at the back. She was huge!

We headed back to the hotel for the evening. Along the way, we saw this cute sculpture. Titanic as a model ship

Emma says - Um, the Titanic stuff was pretty cool. We got to see a lot of things. And lunch was good. Walking back to the hotel was like panic city. I was pretty sure I was going the right way, but I wasn't sure. But, I actually didn't make any wrong turns.

Karen's note - the hotel was on the same road as the museum, but it was around a corner, so you couldn't see it. If there had been any doubt that she could have made it by herself, we would have gone with her