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Luxury Travel

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Luxury Travel

A Postcard From Northern Ireland

Laura Gelder

A Postcard From Northern Ireland

Laura Gelder

This is a feature from Issue 13 of Charitable Traveller. Click to read more from this issue.

Reality & fiction

I started my short trip through Northern Ireland at Titanic Belfast, an exhibition dedicated to the first and only journey of this legendary but tragic ship. Northern Ireland’s capital was where she was constructed and set sail from, and the pride and sorrow was palpable as I followed its timeline – from a metal hulk being hand studded with three million rivets to a floating pleasure palace of unparalleled luxury. The details of the lavish cabins and epic provisions became meaningless as I descended into the last gallery, where a huge cinema shows ghostly footage of Titanic in her final resting place, at the bottom of the Atlantic.

A 45-minute drive later and I was immersed in a fictional drama, at the Game of Thrones Studio tour. The fantasy TV series was filmed here and on location in Northern Ireland and Linen Mill Studios is now a huge attraction. I haven’t seen a single episode, but I was still blown away by everything I saw: hand-drawn storyboards, prosthetic masks of strange creatures, beautiful costumes in opulent fabrics, atmospheric stage sets, and an arsenal of impressive weaponry.

Don't miss the historic rooms and artefacts inside Titanic Hotel Belfast, once the offices of shipbuilders Harland & Wolff, where Titanic was devised

Into the country

Seventy miles west I found a real castle, in County Fermanagh’s Enniskillen. The interior of the island town’s fortress was built in 1428 and the rest in the 1600s, but it stands solid, looking over the misty River Erne. I stepped aboard the Erne Water Taxi for a quick tour down river. As the electric boat glided soundlessly towards Lower Lough Erne, we passed Enniskillen Royal Grammar School, where Oscar Wilde went, and I saw the blue flash of kingfisher.

I finished my brief sojourn at Florence Court House, a beautiful Georgian mansion, once the seat of the Earl of Enniskillen. Its elegant but cosy rooms look out over bucolic parkland, which is as green as I was envious of its location.

Lough Erne connects to the wild Atlantic coast of Donegal and is part of the Fermanagh Lakelands, a water sports paradise

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This is a feature from Issue 13 of Charitable Traveller.