The General's Diary: Belfast, The Titanic and more.

We finally convinced the sat nav lady, that we didn't want to return on the ferry to Scotland and could she please direct us into Belfast. The port where we had landed was about half an hours drive, north of Belfast.
She obliged, and it wasn't long before we were motoring full steam ahead in the right direction. The roads were good, petrol was cheap, the sun was shining, new sights to be seen and everything was going according to plan.

Lulled into a false sense of security?

Less than 30 minutes later, we arrived in Osbourne Road. I had booked a B & B there and by the look of the street it seemed I'd got it right. ( Not that either of us were keeping scores ).
Classy boutiques, fabulous shoe shops, restaurants, lovely old homes, parks and ancient churches all added up to a nice area to be in. You never know exactly where you are going to end up, when you book to stay in a new place - it all looks pretty good on the internet. No photos of derelict dwellings next door, police sirens wailing continuously or high speed trains hurtling past the bedroom window.

Anyway, I was feeling pretty pleased with myself when I heard the sat nav lady say, ' arriving at destination on left '. I looked across expecting to see a charming B & B, and saw instead what seemed to be a funeral parlour. That couldn't be right, it certainly didn't look like the 'All Seasons Hotel'.

After 4 trips up and down Osbourne Rd in peak hour traffic, with the light fading, I could sense Chris becoming just a little testy.

So I decided to ring Paddy, the proprietor of the All Seasons. I explained we were parked near a mortuary and couldn't find the number of the All Seasons hotel. 'Ah', he said, 'you're very close, but the numbers on one side of the street are even and on the other side they are odd'. This was not exactly the response I'd been hoping for. I pushed for a little more detail and was told that ' the numbers were lower on one side than the other'. I had already noticed that opposite 331 was 660. Trying to remain calm and not to shout at the man I asked politely, if it was near anything. ' Ah yes it was near The Other Place'. Apparently I found out later that this was a restaurant, with a black sign with grey lettering.

It seemed the situation called for desperate measures - I'd have to get out of the car to ask a local bystander. There was a little old lady waiting patiently outside a grocery store, opposite. I thought she looked as if she had lived in the area for years and would know the place like the back of her hand.
I was about to ask the question when a bowl was thrust towards me with a few coins in it.. Too late, I realised she was begging for money

Ah well, she was very helpful.......

A little while later we arrived at the All Seasons. Paddy greeted us warmly saying that he was beginning to get a little worried about us. But then we were Australians and they usually found their way around.

THERE IS ALWAYS THE EXCEPTION TO THE RULE: