twangster

Another pub, another beer.

I’m not too sure about the pubs in Cobh. They serve empty glasses.

Arriving into Cobh. We sail around some sort of fort on the outskirts of town. The channel snakes its way around in a big curve. Our final destination for the day. Here we do a 180° turn and slide over to the pier. Train to Cork is very convenient. Not a terrible view from the balcony today. Frogger agrees.

Don't forget to go into airplane mode when you board the ship. Then join the WiFi on board such as 'WiFi-Guest-Shipname'. If it doesn't prompt you at that point, open a web browser and go to logout.com. It should be self-explanatory, just follow the prompts. If you can't figure it out find a Voom specialist, usually in the promenade, esplanade or centrum on boarding day.

Day 13 cruise compass JW May 15 day 13 cruisecompass.pdf

Day Thirteen - Cobh (and Cork), Ireland Underway for a 10am arrival. Progress report: No specific plans today. A Cobh pub crawl may be in order if the weather cooperates.

Olympic had the closest to a normal service life while Britannica was completed just in time to be commandeered in the role of a hospital ship in the First World War. Both ships received safety improvements after the sinking of Titanic. Olympic was retrofitted while Britannica was redesigned as she was under construction. Both ships participated in the First World War. Britannica was lost after striking a mine having never entered commercial service in her intended role. Olympic reentered commercial transatlantic service after the war in 1920 and had a successful career as a luxury liner where she was dubbed 'The Ship Magnificent'. She was eventually scrapped in 1935.

A map of our tour through Belfast.

Earlier I mentioned the ship running out of certain beverages. I'm not sure I've seen this drink of the day before. As a wine drinker this sounds like a terrible idea. 🤣 Has anyone tried this before?

Titanic was an empty shell when she slid from the slipway into the water upon her launch. After getting her propellers fitted in the Thompson dry dock she had her sea trials under her own power for the first time. As we sailed away it was amazing to think of her sailing these same waters for the first, and last time. Titanic went on to Southampton from here where much of her interior finishing was completed before entering service. Yet it wasn't hard to imagine her as a brand new ship and pride of the White Star Line sailing through these waters as we left Belfast tonight.

Back on board I took some photos from the ship looking back at the build site, slipway and drydock for Titanic. These gigantic gantry cranes of Harland and Wolff's were added well after Titanic was built but they are well known in the history of Belfast's shipbuilding past We got lucky, our tour was back before the rush.

We meet up with Donal again after the self led tour within the museum. A bar's tribute to the working class of the day. We board a bus for a panoramic tour of downtown Belfast. Town hall. Queen's University. Donal narrates our drive and talks about the various buildings and events in Belfast's history. The leaning tower of Belfast. Andrew's clock tower. At one point they stabilized the tower and had plans to make it straight but decided to leave the lean as it was. It isn't in danger of leaning any more now that it's been stabilized but so many knew of it as the leaning tower of Belfast they elected to leave it at the angle it had achieved on its own.

The museum contains a self led walking tour with audio headsets that describe each section of the displays within. There is an optional ride that works like a cable car taking occupants along a series of displays illustrating the construction of the ships. The riveting process was an essential element of this type of ship construction and an artform that even today is difficult to replicate. The view of the slipway as seen from the museum. First class accommodations with projected passengers and crew: A section of the museum address the lesson learned and safety improvements that followed. Lastly an area that shows the moments when the wreckage of Titanic was first discovered on the seafloor decades after the tragedy. The floor panels play video that was captured during the discovery. It was a little rushed but it's a fantastic tribute to the Olympic class ships and Titanic in particular.

Across the street the last remaining vessel of The White Star Line can be found. The Nomadic was built to function as a tender boat. The Olympic class ships were so large in their day there weren't very many piers that could accommodate them so in many cases they used tender boats like Nomadic to load and unload passengers from the ocean liners. Another in the Glass of Thrones tributes.

Now a museum for the ship, back in the day there were wooden structures added for the launch where dignitaries, the ship's owners and the press gathered to watch the vessels slip into the water for the first time. These were the drawing offices for Harland and Wolff. Their maritime architects would have worked on the paper drawings for the ship leading up to and through her construction. They are now part of the Titanic Hotel. The hotel uses one of them as a bar. The Titanic Museum is in the shape of a star as seen from above, to represent the White Star Line, the company that operated the Olympic class ocean liners.

As we walk forward along the slipway we come across an outline of where the lifeboats would have been located on the ship. Donal mentions this is the original concrete and rails we are walking on here. Looking down the slipway. Finally we reach where the bow of the ship would have been built.

The boardwalk here is in the shape of the stern of the ships that were built here. Olympic and Titanic were being assembled at the same time with Olympic ahead of Titanic in the process. The sister ships each had their own slipway. Donal is basically standing on what would be the stern of Olympic. The metal rail in the walkway outlines where the ship would have sat during the construction process. The ships were built on land and then slid into the water stern first. This view would be standing near Titanic's stern looking forward along the port side of the vessel. Another Glass of Thrones is found here. The tribute to the show is located between the slipways for the two sister ships, Olympic's slipway on the left and Titanic's slipway on the right. This is where Titanic was built from the keel up.

Continuing our walking tour or dander as Donal refers to it, we come across one of seven "Glass of Thrones" on display in the area. Some of Game of Thrones was shot here in Belfast. Donal was an extra in the show and he shows us some of his roles in various scenes. We walk on to a lighthouse lens on display. The fresnel lens magnifies the light and reflects the light into a highly focused beam that can be seen for many miles. Donal then talks about the piece of land and water we can see from here. This is the end of slipway where the Olympic class ocean liners would enter the water for the first time. Titanic was the second in this class with Olympic (1911) being the first, Titanic (1912) as second and Britannic (1914) as third.

The HMS Caroline is located here. She is the last remaining warship of the Royal Navy from World War One. She is considered a Light Cruiser.

The tasting room and gift shop for the Titanic Distillery that now occupies this space.

In its day this was the largest dry dock in the world. Keel blocks would support the ship once water was pumped out. For scale this figure represents the height of a man. The bow end. The stern end. A famous photograph once the Titanic's propellers were fitted was taken here. In the distance beyond the dry dock Jewel's stacks and crown can be seen.

My day in Belfast starts in the Royal Theater to join my group on this ship excursion. Under a light rain we board a bus for a short ride to the Thompson dock. The cobblestone streets are the same that were here when Titanic was floated into this drydock. We are sort of doing this tour in reverse as it relates to Titanic's construction. This drydock existed solely to fit the propellers onto the ship after it was built and floated over here from around the corner that we will visit later. This was the pump house that would have been used to remove the water from the drydock once a ship was floated into the drydock. Our guide Donal. We were given wireless receivers to wear so we could listen to Donal no matter where he was. This worked out quite well. The building is now being used as a distillery for the Titanic Distillery company who makes an Irish Whiskey here among other alcohols.

Pics from today's tour soon. With our compressed stop here in Belfast it's been a busy time since getting back on board. The ship has run out of Guinness and depending on the bar you visit, most vodkas and even Jameson. Something about inventory from dry dock and customs. Hmmm. It's amazing when you are in dire need, even strawberry gin and sprite doesn't taste that bad. Hoping for re-supply soon.

Some see it as Royal choosing not to service a region but there in some cases they are being pushed to this outcome partially by their own choices going back several years now. Between IMO 2023 and Norway closing the fjords in many cases deployment choices are being impacted for the cruise industry. The UK/EU market is a good example. Iceland from Europe on older ships is all but being eliminated. Newer ships with lower emissions using fuel sources like LNG could do it, but Royal has very few ships with LNG and the ones they do have are too large for the Iceland market. It's not just a matter of Royal choosing not to serve the UK or EU markets as they have in the past, they don't have right sized ships that meet the technical requirements to service these routes given new operational requirements designed to lower ship emissions impacting the entire global shipping industry. This is largely by their own making choosing to build only mega ships with cleaner energy solutions, or by delaying the migration to cleaner energy compared to the competition. They saw this coming while ships like Ovation and Odyssey were being built but they choose to keep those ships running on MGO to save money on re-engineering them. Now, years later, they are trapped by that decision making, long before Jason Liberty was leading the company. Combined with the market in the US changing with so many new to cruise devouring cruises as a new untapped source of revenue, a target customer that prefers short cruises, Royal is chasing the short cruise business with mostly MGO based ships while they can, in the US that as a region is behind some European countries that individually are looking at or have created emissions changes for shipping.

Ship's arrival delayed until 10am due to the weather we had to push through coming from Iceland. My 8:00am meeting time for my excursion has been pushed to 10:00am. Today's excursion... Titanic Trail.