Stormont - City Hall

Route 4
Stormont to City Hall

We caught a bus to where I used to work at Stormont Estate today.
Brian and Darren provided the usual laughs and route advice.  Unfortunately, in this photo - no laughs and the wrong route advice.

We began with the big hill, up the side of the glen.  It's quite a climb up there and that did little to raise spirits.











Things got better when we reached Belmont park.  We asked a married couple to take our photo; the
husband's attempt didn't work and Brian joked "would your daughter like to have a go"?   Very funny but definitely not  appreciated by her husband.

Next stop was Little Lea, former home of CS Lewis.  He's the man who once wrote:

"The safest road to hell is the gradual one - the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts".

If that's the case, I've been on the way to hell for most of the past year.  Nevertheless, it's all been great fun and when I do eventually get to hell, there will be lots of my running friends there.

 

 The Thomas Patton park, off the Holywood Road, is the temporary home of Victoria parkrun.  In this wilderness it's east to forget how close you are to Belfast city centre.
Parkruns are held here every Saturday morning at 9:00am.  You can run or walk - try it once and I bet you will be hooked for life.














We were getting near the city centre now and murals began to appear on walls.  This one celebrates David Healy's wonder goal against England.  It creates a good positive feeling (at least amongst non-English people) and should be repainted.

We finished today in The Streat cafe in Wellington Place.  Good view, good toast and good to be joined by the injured running star Billy Mol.  Hope to have him join in one of our runs sometime soon.

Next run - early January.

Erinvale (Upper Malone Rd) - City Hall

Bus route 8 
Erinvale

My money is on Brian.

Bus up the Malone Rd this morning with Brian. 

The route back to the City Hall was all familiar ground to us but it was good to be starting out on a new challenge.

We started by running down to the Mary Peters Track to see her new statue.

I just about remember her from my schooldays but she is even older than me.

Next we followed the Queens University parkrun course; I must give this one another try soon.  
See www.parkrun.org.uk if you have never been to a parkrun (you don’t even have to be able to run).  Great fun and eighty thousand people, every weekend, can’t be wrong.

 
Then it was along the Burma Road (built from demolished air-raid shelters) to the old lock keepers cottage at Newforge.   

Newforge lock-keepers cottage.

A tiny house which amazingly used to be home to a family of twelve.  Today there were two men, six women and a big fire inside but no food; so Brian and I didn’t stay too long.

 

Back to the towpath and up to Lagan Meadows for some hill training.  Belfast’s original water supply came from here and the pipeline to the city centre gave names to: Conduit Street, Basin Lane and Fountain Street.

We followed the Lagan to the Gasworks and the ran down Albert Street to St Malachy’s Chapel. I like the story of the priest who agreed to silence its bell to avoid disturbing the making of whiskey at nearby Dunville’s Distillery.

 
Today’s run ended at the new Robinson & Cleaver cafe.  Apparently the first floor balcony, with views over the City Hall, is a great place for a meal outside. It was my round, so we made do with a cup of tea on the ground floor.



(Next run - early December)

Belfast Bus Runs

BELFAST BUS RUNS

People sometimes say that Belfast is a dull city, without much green space or things of interest.  This blog is an attempt to prove them wrong.

There are 12 main bus routes within the city; the plan is to travel out to the terminus of each and then run back to the City Hall.  Sounds easy, because most are downhill - but some of the runs are a lot longer than you would expect and the routes back will be diverted through as much parkland as I can find. 

All will end in a different city-centre tea shop.