Daily Times

Every week, our Holiday Hero Neil Simpson takes an in-depth look at a brilliant holiday topic, doing all the legwork so you do not have to.

This week he explores the best of Belfast, which has enjoyed a tourism boom thanks to its links to ‘Game of Thrones’.

The final episode of ‘Game of Thrones’ has once again thrust Belfast and the surrounding area – where much of the action over eight series has been filmed – into the spotlight.

Although the ‘Games of Thrones; Studio Tour at Linen Mill doesn’t open until next spring, there are plenty of other events to attract visitors.

Belfast has a surprising number of well-preserved Victorian gin palaces. Tour them on a three-hour Gin Jaunt with an expert. At £63 per person, it’s not cheap, but it often sells out, so book early.

Add a bicycle, some countryside and craft beer to your day out with the Hidden Brewery Bike tour. After seeing the best of Belfast, you head out of the city to one of Ireland’s oldest independent breweries for free samples. It costs £50 including lunch.

Local Tip: Fancy a drink but don’t have time for a tour? Locals recommend the city’s historic The Crown Liquor Saloon, one of the few pubs owned by the National Trust.

In 1971, Led Zeppelin appeared at Belfast’s Ulster Hall and performed Stairway To Heaven for the first time. Hear the story, and the legendary song, on the Belfast Music Tour, an £8 guided bus trip which includes the history of local stars from Van Morrison to flautist James Galway. Book your tickets at ohyeahbelfast.com/bustour.

For more traditional sounds, join two musicians who guide you to three historic venues with live Irish music. The three-hour tour starts at 4pm and tickets cost £15 from belfasttradtrail.com.

Although the ‘Games of Thrones’ Studio Tour at Linen Mill doesn’t open until next spring, there are plenty of other events to attract visitors

Local Tip: To enjoy music at your own pace, go to one of the city’s oldest buildings, The Dirty Onion pub. It’s a former bonded spirit warehouse from 1780 and bands play there every night.

For free tastings with laughter on the side, try a ‘theatrical food tour’ with an actor playing Chef Barney, the fictional and funny Titanic chef supposedly defrosted after 100 years in an iceberg and determined to recreate a first-class banquet on his old ship. Book Belfast Bred tours for £22 at visitbelfast.com.

The city’s big attraction is the Titanic. Tickets for the Titanic Belfast museum start at £19 from titanicbelfast.com. Alternatively, see the city’s Titanic Quarter from the water with the Lagan Boat Company. Guides point out key Titanic sites plus surprises such as a huge seal colony on nearby rocks.

Local Tip: On dry land, locals suggest a look at the Titanic Hotel, the former Harland & Wolff Drawing Office with the original telephone exchange that took the call about the ship’s fate in 1912.

The story of The Troubles is told in the starkly named and increasingly popular A History Of Terror tour, now running twice daily. Guides explain the city’s difficult recent past and the reconciliation that continues to transform it. Tickets cost £18 from deadcentretours.com.

Belfast (mouth of the Farset) is a city in the United Kingdom, the capital city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast of Ireland. It is the largest city in Northern Ireland and second-largest on the island of Ireland, after Dublin.

It had a population of 333,871 as of 2015.

By the early 19th Century, Belfast became a major port. It played a key role in the Industrial Revolution, becoming the biggest linen-producer in the world, earning it the nickname “Linenopolis”. By the time it was granted city status in 1888, it was a major centre of Irish linen production, tobacco-processing and rope-making. Shipbuilding was also a key industry; the Harland and Wolff shipyard, which built the RMS Titanic, was the world’s biggest shipyard.

Belfast as of 2019 has a major aerospace and missiles industry. Industrialisation and the inward migration it brought made Belfast Ireland’s biggest city and it became the capital of Northern Ireland following the Partition of Ireland in 1922. Its status as a global industrial centre ended in the decades after the Second World War of 1939-1945.

Belfast suffered greatly in the Troubles: in the 1970s and 1980s it was one of the world’s most dangerous cities.

However, a survey conducted by a finance company and published in 2016 rated the city as one of the safest within the United Kingdom.

Throughout the 21st century, the city has seen a sustained period of calm, free from the intense political violence of former years, and has benefitted from substantial economic and commercial growth. Belfast remains a centre for industry, as well as for the arts, higher education, business, and law, and is the economic engine of Northern Ireland.

Belfast is still a major port, with commercial and industrial docks, including the Harland and Wolff shipyard, dominating the Belfast Lough shoreline. It is served by two airports: George Best Belfast City Airport and Belfast International Airport 24 kilometres west of the city. The Globalisation & World Cities Research Network listed Belfast as a Gamma global city in 2018.