Each morning we get up and have a moment of calm and reflection before going online to see what’s going on in the world. We watch the NBC Nightly News from the previous night online and, while it’s reassuring to see the faces of Lester Holt and his crew, it saddens me to see what’s going on across the ocean.
What are the restrictions put in place here in France? The big one is that we must stay at home. We can only go outside for these reasons:
To travel to and from work if your work is essential and cannot be done from home
To buy food and essentials
To attend medical appointments
For vital family reasons – attending to ailing parent or grandparent, for example.
For individual physical exercise, jogging or walking is allowed but must be done alone or in pairs, within 2Km of home. Cycling is banned.
Anyone stepping out of their homes will need to present a certificate on demand, available to download from the government’s website, stating their reason for being out.
People breaking these restrictions will face a fine of €135. Police issued 4,000 fines in the first full day of lockdown, and France’s Interior Minister says the fine could rise to €375 if people continue to flout the rules.
So far, we have not seen anyone being stopped, nor have we been stopped, on the street while going to the store or taking a little walk for exercise. We are, however, taking our properly-completed forms with us every time. If you think this sounds a little like WWII movies you’ve seen of Nazi-occupied Paris (“show me your papers”), it doesn’t feel like that at all here. Instead, there’s generally a spirit of cooperation and carrying the form is no big effort.
Today’s Paris Lockdown Lunch
There’s nothing like having an excellent lunch each day to lift the spirits. Today’s Paris Lockdown Lunch included tagliolini pasta and mushroom sauce with parsley and parmesan cheese, fresh bread with butter, and a lovely Malbec-Merlot red blend from Bordeaux. Santé!
We’re sure living in interesting times, no? It appears “we’re not in Kansas anymore, Toto”, and to prove it, I’m now residing in France, an early coronavirus epicenter.
I was planning to spend the entire month of March in Lyon, France. Then the French restrictions came down and that plan went out the window. I was in Paris last weekend visiting my friend, Marti, just as the measures to reduce public gatherings were announced. That announcement last Saturday, shuttering cafes and other non-essential businesses, throughout France was astounding here, if prudent.
On the street that morning in Marti’s neighborhood, people were out and about, but there was definitely a somber mood in the air. There were lots of well-behaved shoppers queued up at the grocery stores and bakeries. Yes, the toilet paper aisle was cleaned out, but there was still plenty of wine to go around. Pharmacies had no hand-sanitizer or wipes, of course.
Outdoor cafe seating stacked indoors for the duration
Riding to the Gare de Lyon train station in Paris on Monday at midday revealed all the closed cafes, with their traditional sidewalk chairs and tables stacked inside, and no sign of life at Burger King or McDonald’s.
French President Macron delivers the bad news
No sooner had I gotten back to Lyon than additional restrictions were announced. People here were not taking the need to voluntarily isolate seriously (there were pictures online of large groups of people congregating in parks and along the river front) so the government clamped down harder.
All public gatherings were banned and gathering places, such as public parks, closed. Public transportation services have been reduced to the minimum. Grocery stores, bakeries, butchers, pharmacies, and doctor’s offices could remain open – everything else had to close. People were ordered to remain at home and self-isolate, teleworking was mandated, for 15 days. I love the fact that book stores are considered essential and remain open.
Your papers, please…
They say 100,000 police and security officers across France have been mobilized to stop and interrogate anyone found on the street or at roadblocks about why they’re not at home. There’s an official form you can download and print that describes the five acceptable reasons for being on the street (grocery shopping, going to doctor, etc.) and you must show this form if asked. Failure to do so can result in fines up to €150. In addition, France closed its borders to any non-citizens or non-residents trying to enter.
One customer comes out before one can go in, no more that 10 customers in shop at once
So, a lot of things were happening very quickly. The announcement of the further restrictions came Monday night and went into effect Tuesday morning. As you may know, airline companies have been hit very hard by all of this and are struggling. This resulted in my British Airways flight from Lyon to London Tuesday being cancelled, along with almost all other BA flights. The French rail system reduced the number of its trains. Naturally, in this Golden Age of information via the Internet, it’s often hard to get accurate information when you need it, especially in a crisis. I found it very hard to tell which transportation modes were still operating Tuesday and whether they would still be doing so the next day.
The U.K. was making noises about more restrictions so going on to Bristol by any means seemed like it might be a poor choice if the U.K. was locked down like France. I considered just flying from Paris back to the U.S. but there were almost no direct flights, and any connecting flights did so in suspect places, like Frankfurt. I say suspect because Germany had already closed its borders, so how was a flight going to connect in Frankfurt? In addition, the stories coming out about the chaos in U.S. airport Arrivals halls were awful. Did I really want to fly into a “virus incubator” and spend hours standing with hundreds of other people, all jammed together?
I thought not. So I got back in touch with Marti and she has kindly let me join her in Paris, for the duration. I have about three months on my tourist visa here but a lot of those concerns may go out the window as this thing goes on.
The Louvre is closed
I’ll be posting in the coming days about the ongoing situation here. I don’t need to repeat what the doomsayers have been suggesting regarding the future, but clearly travel-related industries are going to be severely affected and may not bounce back for years.
I will say I believe it will get very bad here and it will last a long time (I do not think this will blow over in a month or two). The U.K. and U.S. are going to experience the same issues as Europe and will pay a price for dragging their feet in preparation. If you’re in either country you should prepare now for some difficult times. Clearly, the current U.K. and U.S. administrations have dropped the ball and missed the opportunity to get out ahead of this. It’s shocking here, for example, to see coverage on TV last night of kids going about Spring Break in Florida as if nothing is happening in the world. Please, friends, do not underestimate this.
I don’t want to leave you on that depressing note, so I will say that it’s a lovely 68-degree, sunny, almost first day of Spring here and we’re having a nice lunch on the balcony. This is Paris, after all.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, 2,000 years ago Lyon was a Roman city called Lugdunum. It was a key city for Empire, the capital of Roman Gaul, the intersection of many Roman roads, and the birthplace of the Emperor Claudius. I spent an afternoon last weekend touring the Roman ruins and visiting the great museum beside them.
The view from the stage
Located on top of the western hills above my apartment, the ruins include a bath house, a 3,000-seat odeum music/poetry venue, and a 10,000 seat amphitheater. All three were quarried for building stones in later centuries and exist today diminished in size. The large theater has a rebuilt stage, is set up for modern lighting and sound, and is used for events.
It’s a pretty steep uphill climb to get to the ruins but luckily there’s a funicular that runs up the hill from the local Metro station. The tunnels it runs through have little illuminated niches with Roman statuary in them, a nice touch.
The Lyon Museum of Gallo-Roman Civilization is a really cool place, buried in the hillside adjacent to the large amphitheater. It even has large windows that look out at the stage. I’ve drawn a yellow line around the museum in this photo:
The museum is a concrete marvel, with four of its five stories buried underground. It houses a magnificent collection of artifacts, including nicely-restored mosaics, and a lot of stones and statues. The structure is designed so that you progress downward through four floors of exhibits and has great exhibit lighting. Despite being underground under tons of concrete, I felt that it was an open and airy space. The entry fee was just €4 and included a audio guide!
In addition to the well-displayed artifacts and exhibits, seats and benches were liberally available, some of the multi-media presentations were really well done, and there was a complete absence of guards keeping an eye on things.
A nice animated display showed the amphitheaters as they were, complete with their long-gone stage houses, and there was a working (just push the button) scale model of the stage showing the mechanics used for changing scenery. As a veteran stage hand, that was my kind of exhibit!
You never know who you’ll run into when visiting a museum; the two scary dudes above, for example.
Basilica of Notre-Dame de Fourvière
Not too far away, on what was the site of Emperor Trajan’s Forum, the Christians have had their revenge with the Basilica of Notre-Dame de Fourvièr. Next to it is Lyon’s own min-Eiffel Tower replica, used only for modern communications tech.
If you’re in Lyon, I highly recommend a visit to the ruins and the museum!
I’m unpacked and living in Lyon, France for the next month. I had a comfortable, two-hour flight from Dublin on Aer Lingus and the French Customs and Border Control officer stamped my passport without asking me a single question. My luggage appeared as expected and in good shape.
Cobblestone streets and three- and four-story buildings
Lyon is in the southeastern part of France, about 467km (290 miles) from Paris and 148km (90 miles) from the Swiss border and Geneva. It’s an ancient town and was a key part of the Roman empire, back when it was called Lugdunum. Lyon is the third largest city in France and, historically, was known as an important area for the production and weaving of silk. In modern times, it has developed a reputation as the capital of gastronomy in France.
Lyon is divided into three parts by two rivers, the Saône and the Rhône, which converge to the south. The western part of town is Vieux Lyon (old Lyon) and my flat is within the blue circle above. My neighborhood is part of the charming old town, with sloping, cobblestone streets fronting old buildings. The main attraction in my area is the Cathedral and the really touristy area is north of it; my place is just south of it. So I’m close to a lot of interesting things, but not directly in the flow of the tourist hordes. Come to think of it, I’m not sure there are tourist hordes in March. At least I haven’t seen any yet.
My flat is in a very old building, a few steps up from the street, and was nicely renovated by a local architect. You can see the rooms here: https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/34456841. As always, there are a few quirks (hit my head twice on a low beam) but generally it’s really pleasant. The shower is terrific: roomy, good water pressure, rainfall shower head. The flat’s in a great location, with a Metro stop just 50 yards away, and bakeries, banks, small grocery stores, and good restaurants nearby. My initial Airbnb throw-a-dart-at-the-map selection process seems to be working well!
Behind my flat the ground rises steeply to the Fourvière hills and atop them are the ruins of a large Roman theater complex and a modern Basilica. The walk up there is steep enough that there’s a funicular that leaves from the Metro station. I’ll definitely be exploring the hill top.
The weather so far has been mixed sun and clouds, with light winds and temps in the 40s-50s, which is an improvement on my last few stormy, windy weeks in Dublin.
Lyon is foodie central and is famous for its bouchons. A bouchon is a restaurant that serves traditional Lyonnaise cuisine, such as sausages, salade lyonnaise, duck pâté, and roast pork. Compared to other forms of French cooking, such as nouvelle cuisine, bouchon dishes are quite fatty and heavily oriented around meat. There are several bouchons near the Cathedral and I will investigate! In addition, traditional French, Italian, and Indian restaurants abound. In case I miss Dublin, there are two Irish pubs nearby, and if I get a hankering for ribs, there’s an American BBQ joint just around the corner.
I like the French restaurant ambience – tables and chairs spilling out onto the street, menu boards, waiters with white aprons in attendance – and especially the great French wines. Beer is, of course, also available, with good German brews on tap. A bar at the end of my street even sells Paulaner Munich Lager in sizes up to 1-litre in the traditional Oktoberfest Maas mugs.
As elsewhere, concerns about the coronavirus are running high here. I did not see anyone, though, in either airport or on my plane wearing a face mask. The papers report that Paris has taken some pre-emptive actions, closing some schools and canceling some events, but I’m unaware of anything like that yet here in Lyon. I’m washing my hands a lot, using hand sanitizer in public, and feel great. I hope you are, and do, too.
Tomorrow I’m going to venture out to learn to ride the Metro and go to the Tourist Information office. Au revoir for now!
Dublin and Jameson Whiskey are bound together like Dublin and Guinness, so I decided to take the Jameson Distillery Bow Street Experience yesterday. Bow Street is north of the River Liffey and to the west of town, in an area that now houses the courthouse and many law offices, and it’s here that fine Jameson Irish Whiskey was distilled. Yes, “was distilled” because in 1971 the distilling operation was moved to far away Midleton, Cork County. So, distilling did occur at Bow Street for nearly 200 years but none goes on there now. So, my “experience” was not going to include any viewing of the current distillery.
Another interesting thing about this move to Cork is that various companies pooled their resources to create the common Midleton distillery and so Jameson, Powers, Tullamore Dew, Paddy, Redbreast, Green Spot, and Yellow Spot whiskeys are all made there.
Creative glass recycling
Nonetheless, the public facility on Bow Street is very handsome, with two large bars, huge old beams, and scores of empty Jameson barrels and bottles. The Experience is a high-tech, multi-media, three-room presentation that takes about 40 minutes. In that time, I and the seven others in our group learned the history of the company, received a great explanation of the brewing/distilling process, and tasted three whiskeys at the end. The middle part there, the process explanation, was very hands-on, with a variety of things to touch and smell. Did you know that whiskey production starts, essentially, by making beer?
I noticed that, at the exit of each room, there was a hand sanitizer dispenser discretely attached to the wall. Our excellent guide, Liam, used them religiously and, in this age of coronavirus worries, so did I.
For the tasting, we were given whiskeys that were single-distilled (Jack Daniels), double-distilled (Johnnie Walker Black), and triple-distilled (Jameson), and a glass of water to clear our palates between samples. It was no surprise that the Jameson was the smoothest and best-tasting. However, at no time was putting a drop of water into your whiskey discussed, which surprised me, but I was too busy downing my samples to inquire about it.
Afterwards we were ushered into a very slick gift shop and then out into the bar area. As an extra bonus, our ticket was good for one glass of the “Daily Grog” at the bar, which was a choice of Jameson neat, on ice, or with ginger and lime. I had the latter and it was sacrilegious but refreshing. I even received my Jameson Brand Ambassador Certificate.
I did manage to refrain from buying the €65 rare Jameson bottle with personalized label they were hawking. But, if you go, you might want one. The experience was fun, informative, and very well done, for €20 (€19 over 65). Tickets available online.
As introduced in my last post, today was Pancake Tuesday, which was a bust. I only found one place, in a far away south Dublin suburb, doing something special (free pancakes all day) and two places that actually serve crepes, not pancakes, offering specials. I inquired at a few but none of the other more central restaurants that sell pancakes every day for breakfast were making a big deal out of it. The grocery stores were offering sales of frozen toaster pancakes, but that was it. I wasn’t really that excited about mass carbo-loading pancakes with sugary maple syrup anyway.
I note that I will just miss the Dublin visit of English Royals William and Kate, who arrive the day after I depart next week for Lyon. Too bad, as a confirmed monarchist, I would have loved to stand in the crowd and get a brief glimpse of them. Maybe next time?
It seems that the Six Nations Rugby competition is now a possible Coronavirus victim! There’s talk of canceling the Ireland vs Italy match on March 7th here in Dublin. A good piece of Northern Italy is locked down right now and, as a result, the Irish are not sure if they’re keen on planeloads of Italian fans coming to town. For once, my timing might be good, getting out of town just before the storm. So far, there have been zero confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Ireland.
Even the Venice Carnival was cut short!
Despite the snow and ice warnings issued for parts of Ireland today, the plants in St. Stephens Square are insisting on an early Spring. There’s nothing quite as refreshing as a nice park in the middle of a city. I’m now getting in two laps a day, for more than 9,800 steps, and it’s been a pleasure watching the park wake up.
I’m enjoying my last week in Dublin and on my short list of last-minute things to do will be taking the Jameson DistilleryExperience on Thursday. Is this a trend? It seems no one offers a “tour” anymore, now it’s an “experience”. Hmm, I’d be keen to know if the ticket price for an Experience is 20% more than the price for an old Tour.
Wasn’t it Jimi Hendrix who recorded the immortal words: Are You Experienced? Let’s see if I can say that three times quickly after my distillery visit. Stay tuned!
This coming Tuesday, February 25th, is apparently Pancake Tuesday, the day the Irish all go flipping crazy for pancakes! Pancake Tuesday (or Shrove Tuesday, to give it its proper name) always falls before Ash Wednesday which marks the start of Lent. In the “old days” the basic idea was that, before the fasting and abstinence of Lent started, all the rich foods in the house had to be used up. The pancake was a good way to combine them all. In the U.S. this may or may not manifest itself as free pancakes at your local IHOP. Here, it’s a bit more symbolic now but, even so, ready-made pancakes are available in grocery stores next to the bread shelves. I’ve no idea how good a mass-produced, pre-packaged pancake could be and I’m not really interested in finding out. Local breakfast spots are apparently doing some pancake specials Tuesday and I will investigate.
As I mentioned earlier, we’re getting wild weather here. For example, this afternoon I left the apartment for my daily walk in bright sunshine and clear skies. Sure, there was a stiff wind and temps were in the low 40s but the sun really felt good. Within the course of my 70-minute walk, it clouded over completely, rained briefly once then stopped, snowed and hailed for about 10 minutes then stopped, rained briefly again, and on my return it was sunshine and clear skies again. Very entertaining but tough on those who don’t dress appropriately. The weather forecast “sunny and clear” was, as they say here, complete shite.
As your keen observer of homo sapiens’ behavior, I note some interesting fashion trends. For women, Doc Martens combat boots are back (or are still) in fashion, as are high-water pants with a single cuff roll but no socks (don’t they get cold ankles?). Ripped and torn pants are big and so are leggings (haven’t they heard of LANP? Leggings Are Not Pants!) – again, chilly, no?
Also, shiny, tight, stretchy pants that simulate leather are popular, if not always attractive. Young guys prefer hoodies, tight jeans, and full, brewer beards, while goatees are not seen on anyone under 50.
The “trainer” (or “running shoe” in U.S. parlance) is the shoe of choice for guys, who often do not deign to zip or button their coats, the better to show of their scant tee shirts and showcase their frost-bitten manliness. Flat caps, which tend to blow off, are not as popular as wool hats. Everyone wears down coats and scarves.
I’ve been doing some research for short term lodging in the second half of 2020. I marvel at the way some hosts choose to advertise their places, for example, when their listings include:
– No photos of the space at all – Photos that are all out of focus – Only six photos, three of which are of the patio, one of which is of the Town Hall – Photos taken at night with poor lighting, so you can’t see anything – Photos taken while someone messy was living there, showing their dripping toothpaste in the bathroom sink and their underwear on the floor – Photos taken without cleaning first – shower mold, anyone? – Photo of a bed that fills the entire room – you can only get on it from its foot – Photo of the bed, which consists of a mattress on top of a stack of dirty- and worn-looking shipping pallets – splinters, anyone? – Photos of apartments that are jammed with every kind of dust catcher and knick knack imaginable, with not an empty horizontal space anywhere.
Yes, it’s not all fun and games finding acceptable accommodations!
My final two weeks in Dublin begin tomorrow so I’m enjoying the city while I can. The weather has been a bit weird lately, what with two named storms (Ciara and Dennis) in a row hitting Ireland and the U.K. We’re under a Yellow warning today for downpours and high winds but the early part of the day was sunny and clear, and just a bit windy. As I finished up my daily walk through town, the clouds came in and the torrential rain started, then stopped again. On the other hand, England has been getting pasted with hurricane-force winds, 100-foot waves, and lots of flooding. Luckily, my local, The Celt, is just around the corner and I should have little trouble getting to my Sunday pint of Guinness in a few hours.
No sign of the “bomb cyclone” here in St. Stephen’s Square today.
As for the popular Coronavirus, only one person has a suspected case here in Dublin and a few dozen other travelers have tested negative. Nonetheless, as elsewhere, face masks have sold right out in Ireland, though I don’t see many people wearing them on the street. I bought a few masks myself weeks ago before the real shortage began. Sadly, the simple mask type that I (and most others) have is not really supposed to offer much protection against viruses. But, what the heck, I hate to be the last one to the party. Regardless of the mask type, my beard is not really conducive to a tight facial seal anyway, so having a mask at all is mostly wishful thinking.
Do you have yours?
There’s an interesting article in the Sunday Washington Post today about the flood of requests hitting mask manufacturers in the U.S. and their inability to keep up with demand.
In other news, after testing out the lattes around the city, the winner is Esquire Coffee, in the shop right below my flat. The losers include Starbucks, Costa, Insomnia, Frank & Honest, and a couple of independents. I’m not sure what it is, but Esquire’s latte is tastier, richer, and creamier than the others. Now, I’m a relatively new coffee drinker (just in the last four years) and not even a daily consumer, so my palate is admittedly pretty green. Nonetheless, as an official “hedonist with class” (thanks, Arthur Hanket) you can trust me on this!
The glorious Esquire Coffee latte
Parlez vous française? As mentioned in a previous post, I’ve been spending about an hour a day brushing up on my French, in preparation for relocating to Lyon, France in a few weeks. I’ve been using the free DuoLingo site, which is useful but not quite as good as an expensive course like Pimsleur. In years gone by, when planning to stop in France while on vacation, I would prepare by listening to Pimsleur CDs while commuting to and from work, and the courses were great. I’m sure drivers in adjacent cars were sure I was a nut job, talking to myself as I drove, but Pimsleur served me well. How expensive is it? Their online courses, levels 1-5, cost $575, which is not in my budget these days.
Last Saturday, I wound up watching the Ireland vs Wales Six Nations rugby match, in a pub full of Wales supporters! It seems that they all came to Dublin just to wear their red Wales jerseys, watch the match on TV in a pub, and make a lot of noise.
This is an interesting phenomenon: I know people who would drive from D.C. to Baltimore to watch the Redskins play in the Ravens stadium, but I don’t know anyone who would drive there just to watch the game on TV in a bar. Remember, these Wales supporters had to take a ferry or airplane across the Irish Sea to get here, so it was no small effort. No matter, every pub on my block was stuffed with red jerseys, including my local “The Celt” which was just too jammed, so I found myself at O Shea’s across the street.
Despite Wales being heavily favored, Ireland won convincingly, 24-14. The Welshmen took it well and didn’t rip up the place. Marvelous sport rugby: during the match the Head Coach, wearing a suit, is up in a booth rather than on the field, with a camera on him all the time, doing little but watching and reacting to plays.
Saturday was also National Election Day here in the Republic of Ireland. Polls were open from 7am to 10pm and it was hoped that the new weekend voting day would increase turn-out. Sadly, turn-out may have been stunted by lousy weather and was actually down a few percentage points (62%) from the 2016 election. Saturday voting still seems like a good idea to me.
Interestingly, vote counting did not start until 9am Sunday (giving poll workers a night of rest first) and Ireland uses a Ranked voting system, so voters mark their 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc. choices. If no candidate is the 1st choice of more than half of the voters, then all votes cast for the candidate with the lowest number of 1st choices are redistributed to the remaining candidates based on who is ranked next on each ballot. Some U.S. states have used ranked voting for some of their primaries, notably the Democratic Party in Virginia.
While I’m in Dublin, I thought I’d check into whether or not I’m eligible for Irish citizenship. If I had an Irish (EU) passport, my concerns about certain visa limits would be nearly erased. My great-grandfather was born in Ireland in 1852 and emigrated to the U.S. so I might be eligible.
My timing is terrible, though, as about half of the U.K. population has gotten the same idea, what with the threat of Brexit in the last few years, so the Irish bureaucracy that handles applications is swamped. Being physically in Dublin was no help at all as I found out all of this is handled by phone and through snail mail. And forget looking up my relatives online in an official Irish citizens database – as it stands now, I can pay about $300 and wait 9-12 months to find out if I even qualify to apply! As part of that I have to furnish official copies of birth and death certificates, some from more than 100 years ago. Yeah, right.
Did you watch the Academy Awards on Sunday night? My friend Robert, with his impeccable taste in movies, urged me last month to see Parasite. It won both Best Picture and Best Foreign Picture on Sunday, and I discovered it was already playing at the Irish Film Institute here, so off I went to see the Tuesday matinee. Bless the Senior Discount – it only cost €7.50 – and I enjoyed a large, modern, well-equipped, and nearly empty theater for my viewing pleasure. No popcorn, but they did have a nice cafe and bar for a pre-show lunch. Parasite is a subtitled Korean movie, a dark comedy about families at opposite ends of the economic scale and the effects of greed. The ending was a little unsatisfying but I still recommend the movie to you if you haven’t seen it. It didn’t win Best Picture, etc. for nada.
And, speaking of foreign languages, I’ve been brushing up on my French and doing my city research in anticipation of moving to Lyon, France in early March. Ça va bien?
Belfast was where the ill-fated RMS Titanic luxury ocean liner was built. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, Belfast was a major shipbuilding port and the primary company, Harland and Wolff, employed 15,000 people. The dry docks, quays, and other facilties are now gone, but not forgotten; a major attraction in Belfast is the Titanic Experience Museum.
This cool building is the home of the museum and it sits right at the site of the now-gone dry dock where the Titanic’s keel was laid and its hull constructed. The outline of the ship is etched into the surrounding pavement, and the building has a hull-like shape and titanium cladding. While in Belfast, Marti and I spent a very enjoyable two hours here. Admission was £16.50, with a senior discount. We found the audio guide to be completely unnecessary.
The museum is very well laid out and exposes you first to the industrial and social foundations of the city in the early 1900s. In addition to being home to a shipbuilding empire, it was also had numerous linen mills, both of which employed a large, poorly-paid, uneducated, workforce. The exhibit materials and technology are first-rate and very professional in presentation, with multi-media displays worked nicely in among photos, artifacts, and printed text on the walls.
The rise of the shipbuilding industry and the motives behind the building of the Titanic are presented. Interestingly, the ship was built primarily to transport 3rd Class passengers (more than 1,100 of them at a time) who were part of the wave of Irish immigration to the West, and the revenue from a small number of 1st and 2nd Class passengers was considered icing on the cake.
The museum explains the process of building the ship: laying the keel, adding the ribs, attaching hull plates, and installing engines, propellers, and anchors. This is very well done, using models and videos. This includes a ride in an amusement park-type car through a suggested shipyard and the hull that injects a little Disney into things. It’s brief, informative, and not too silly; if anything I wish it had been longer.
1st Class stateroom
Once launched into the water in 1911 (an event attended by over 100,000 people – an astonishingly large crowd in those days), the Titanic spent a year being fitted out with its interior facilities. The museum provided neat full-scale examples of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Class accommodations.
The virtual tour rose upward, deck by deck
In addition, a wonderful immersive video tour of the ship’s interior, from top to bottom, provided a great sense of where things were and their scale. Exhibits of artifacts of everything from fabrics to ropes compete for your attention. Film of the actual launch, sea trials, and formal dedication ceremonies are presented, and engineering drawings and large scale models are on display. There are even “touchable” samples and thoughtful exhibits aimed at children.
The museum is easy to move through and allows you to skip things like the ride if desired. We encountered no bottlenecks, even with several buses of school kids on the premises with us.
Sadly, we all know what happened in the end and it’s treated respectfully and thoroughly in the museum, but without sensationalism. Less well-known, at least to me, was the outcome of the investigations that followed, resulting in numerous changes being made in maritime safety regulations for passenger ships. For example, that there be enough lifeboats to accommodate all passengers, and that radios be manned around the clock. A full-scale replica of one of the Titanic’s lifeboats, to contain 40 people, is on display and it was very small. I couldn’t imagine being in it with that many others in open ocean water.
A theater in the museum provides film coverage of the modern day discovery of the Titanic wreck on the ocean floor and an exhibit contains some of the artifacts retrieved. Another exhibit looks at the many books, films, and legends the Titanic has inspired, and a final one discusses modern ocean exploration.
Outside the building you can walk around on the outline of the Titanic in its former dry dock area, as mentioned earlier, and also see examples of full-scale engineering outlines of various ship components (hull plates and such) etched into the pavement.
The Titanic Experience Museum is excellent and Marti and I enjoyed it very much. I recommend it to anyone visiting Belfast. I note that there are two Titanic museums in the U.S. and their locations – in Branson, MO and Pigeon Forge, TN – may be a reflection of their quality.
The Wikipedia entry for the RMS Titanic is especially good and I also recommend it to you.
The Occasionally-Examined Life 