Yeah...I know the title of this post is stupid. It's supposed to be tongue-in-cheek. It will make sense later on, I promise. Or at least I hope.
On Sunday April 17, 2011 at probably just before 9 p.m., I turned on HBO in my place on North Glebe Road in Arlington, Virginia and watched the first ever episode of Game of Thrones. At that point in time fresh off The Sopranos and Deadwood (still the best HBO series ever!) I would have watched any original content on that channel and Game Of Thrones interested me enough after episode one to tune in the next week. Although honestly, I was a little skeptical.
I warmed to it in a serious way. And for about 72 of the next 422 weeks, I made sure Sunday nights were locked onto that same cable channel wherever I was in the world, be it at home or on a cruise ship off the coast of Alaska or wherever else I was that I could tune in and watch the latest episode live. You might say I was obsessed. Although I'd probably call it dedicated.
For the first few seasons, I associated Game of Thrones with many different locales that actually exist in our real world. Iceland. Spain. Morocco. Croatia. Malta. But as the seasons wore on and the show reached its conclusion, I started to understand more and more of the show was shot in Northern Ireland, whether it be on sound stages in Belfast or in the countryside around that same city. So in a week in Ireland and Northern Ireland, I was bound to come into contact with something from the show, right?
I made sure of it. We spent a total of four days in and around Belfast. In three of those four days, we took in plenty of Game of Thrones sights, which have become a significant tourist industry in that part of the United Kingdom. Turns out I'm not the only one out there dedicated. Or obsessed. Pick one if you want; either way you'd be close enough.
Before I get too far with this post, it does seem odd to me, considering all the amazing places I've been over the past six plus years, that I would travel to see some sites celebrating a television show. I mean a little more than ten years ago, this kind of thing wouldn't have been possible because the show didn't even exist. On the surface, it seems inauthentic in a way. It might even seem like some of the places we visited to get our GOT fix are completely artificial or inconsequential. I'll take all of that if you want to throw it at me. We had fun doing this so I'm writing about it.
Belfast is Game of Thrones central. No pilgrimage (am I really ready to call what I did a pilgrimage?) of this sort could skip the capital city of Northern Ireland. We started our journey there on our very first day after crossing into the United Kingdom on the recently installed Glass of Thrones trail. You thought the title of this post was stupid...just wait.
Glass of Thrones, I say? I do! The final season of this exalted series featured just six episodes. On the air date of each of those last six, one giant stained glass window was unveiled at six different locations around Belfast by Tourism Ireland. All six together formed a sequence from City Hall over the River Farset to all the way north of Titanic Belfast. About a mile and a half or maybe a bit more overall in length. They are still there. Instant tourist attraction!! And of course, we had to do all six, one for each of the four central houses in the show (Stark, Lannister, Baratheon and Targaryen) plus another for the white walkers and one final one for the Iron Throne.
Each of the first four windows features scenes from the history of each principal house. There are plenty of happy memories along with some gruesome stuff in pretty much each one, although there's probably more of the latter than the former. Want to re-live the glory of the North? House Stark's display shows Jon Snow cutting down Boltons with Longclaw in the battle of the bastards (that's a happy memory) offset by the death of Robb, Talisa and Catelyn in the red wedding at the Twins. If you are a Lannister, Baratheon or Targaryen fan you might have to dig a little deeper for the joy in these things.
Make it to the fifth Glass and you'll find Hodor holding the door against the onslaught of wights fighting to get to Brandon Stark, freshly anointed as the brand new three-eyed raven. If there's a more poignant character in the entire series than Hodor, I don't know who it is. That part of the story brings me closer to tears than any other plot line in any of the eight seasons.
Keep going to the end of the trail and you'll find the Iron Throne waiting for you. Or at least a tractor seat in front of the stained glass depiction of the Iron Throne. It's an inventive touch to add this seat in front of the last backdrop. Plus, after a mile and a half or so, a place to sit is welcomed, especially if it's been raining most of the way along your journey (like it was for ours!). Glass of Thrones done.
So Glass of Thrones sucked people (or at least us) into Belfast, right? Want more manufactured tourist attractions to get people to Northern Ireland? Try Door of Thrones. I told you it would get stupid-er. But if you decide to do the entire Door of Thrones circuit, be prepared to travel a lot further because they are spread around the entirety of Northern Ireland.
Not familiar with Door of Thrones? I'm not surprised. Turns out that during the filming of the series, some of the trees that flank the King's Road were felled in a storm. Yes, the King's Road is real although it's called the Dark Hedges in real life. We visited that site on the way up to the Giant's Causeway on our second day in Northern Ireland.
Anyway, rather than just cut the downed beeches up for firewood, HBO bought the trees and had doors made out of them, complete with bas reliefs of scenes from the show's history. There are a total of ten of these things. Together, they constitute the Door of Thrones set. And you'll have to travel far and wide to see them all. We found two: one at the Fullerton Arms pub in Ballycastle and one at The Cuan (pronounced queue-ann) pub in Strangford.
The Cuan owns door number one, which shows a map of Westeros, and the Fullerton Arms owns door number six, which shows a dragon (presumably Drogon, the biggest of the three). During a stop for lunch, we managed to talk to one of the owners of The Cuan about how they acquired their door. It was apparently offered to them as a gift of thanks for housing most of the stars of House Stark along with Lena Headey during the filming of the Winterfell scenes in the early seasons of the series. I imagine the Fullerton Arms might have a similar story (if we had been allowed to stay long enough to ask them) since that pub is near Ballintoy where some of the scenes of the Iron Islands were filmed.
I think this is a pretty cool gesture from the network. If nothing else it perpetuates a constant trail of geeks like me (and worse!) visiting the places that supported the show during filming. We stopped our Door of Thrones visits at two, although we could have easily hit the one in a Belfast coffee shop if we had wanted. Two was enough I think.
So visiting stained glass windows and carved doors is all well and good but there has to be something more fun and real, right? You bet! Want to see the King's Road? Hit up the Dark Hedges (like we did) on the way up to Bushmill's Distillery or the Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge or the Giant's Causeway or just a special stop just to see the trees. Want to see where scenes from the first season were filmed right in the historic Irish countryside? Call or email or just sign up for a tour from Game of Thrones Tours.
What's so special about Game of Thrones Tours? Well, if you are a fan of the show, pretty much everything. They offer a series of tours out of Belfast, Dublin or Derry which really amount to two different itineraries. The first is a trip to the north coast of Northern Ireland to see filming locations for the Iron Islands along with the Giant's Causeway (which is NOT in Game of Thrones). The second is a trip south of Belfast to visit Winterfell (yes THE Winterfell) and some other locations in the North associated with House Stark. After all, House Stark is hands down the best house in the series.
There's one more twist to Game of Thrones Tours' agenda: your tour will be led by someone who was actually in the show. No, you won't get Peter Dinklage or Kit Harrington or Emilia Clarke sitting at the front of your bus playing DVDs and providing their personal narrative of their experiences on the show. You won't even get Liam Cunningham (Ser Davos Seaworth) or Jacob Anderson (Grey Worm) or someone like that. All those people I'm sure are either looking for their next gig or spending time on the Comic-Con tour circuit.
Think "extras".
Let me introduce you to our guide for the day: Robbie. Robbie's claim to Game of Thrones fame is as an archer for Stannis Baratheon in the Battle of the Blackwater (season two, episode nine, if you must know). If there's a tour guide out there more suited to and enthusiastic about his role in the tourism industry than Robbie is, I don't know who they are or who they work for. This guy was fantastic. He was so completely into the series and the tour he was leading and that commitment was just awesome. Get on Robbie's tour and just wait until he gets to the spot where Tyrion and Jon Snow camped on their way to The Wall.
Just a bit more about Robbie (indulge me, OK?). He got involved in the show because HBO was looking for trained archers to be part of the cast and he was in a local archery club. Now, realistically speaking, HBO could have faked this, right? I mean it's not like we as viewers would pick up on the fact that trained archers were in the episodes, right? They could have just CGI-ed it or shot it in a way that showed arrows in the sky shot by off camera personnel. But they insisted on using extras that knew how to handle a bow and arrow.
Robbie first attended a casting call for applicants that he figured would be attended by 20 or 30 people (there were hundreds). He passed that audition but only if he spent the next four months growing out his hair and beard (he's working retail at this point but does what the network asks). Four months later (and with a full beard and long hair), he's back shooting arrows at a target for HBO. No accuracy, no part in the show. Fortunately, Robbie's not just in the archery club, he's the coach. He passes and makes it into the show.
For me this narrative is useful for two reasons. First, it shows the lengths that HBO went to get the details right in this series (let's ignore the water bottle and coffee cup in the last season, shall we?). They didn't have to have trained archers in the Battle of the Blackwater but they did anyway. Second, I think it's awesome that Robbie's life was changed completely by chance. He happened to have an interest in archery that translated into an entire new career path based on a television show. How cool is that?
The sunny morning and afternoon we spent with Robbie (the only sunny day we saw in Ireland) took us to Winterfell, the Twins, all the way north of The Wall and to the hall where the banner men of House Stark declared their allegiance to the King in the North, Robb Stark. Or in our world, we went to Castle Ward, Tollymore Forest Park and Inch Abbey. You can visit all these places on your own. But I doubt you will get the insight and have as much fun as you would if you joined Game of Thrones Tours for the day. And I really do mean a day. Like 8:30 a.m. to 5ish p.m. This is not a short trip.
Of course when you get to the places where the show was filmed, you don't necessarily see the same structures and scenes you see in the show. Yes, the season one courtyard scenes at Winterfell were shot in the courtyard of Castle Ward but there's only one tower at Castle Ward vs. two at Winterfell and the balconies where Ned and Catelyn Stark watched Bran struggle with bow and arrow target practice are not there at all. The reasons for this are simple: the second tower was added by computer and the balconies were added for the show and then disassembled. After all, Castle Ward is an historic site and legit tourist attraction not related to Game of Thrones. They can't just leave something added by a television network.
I have to say it was a little disappointing. I wanted to see Winterfell and just assumed that Castle Ward would way more resemble the Stark home than it actually did. One of the reasons I assume this was that Winterfell was in play in every season. Heck, the Night King led a siege on Winterfell in season eight. But Robbie pointed out that when Theon Greyjoy captured Winterfell, he set fire to the place. And you can't very well set Castle Ward on fire, now can you?
HBO's solution to this dilemma was to build a full size replica of Winterfell elsewhere in Northern Ireland. Most scenes in Winterfell after the first or second season were therefore filmed on the fake Winterfell (or is it the real one?) built especially for the show. That location is off limits. For now. It's allegedly being fixed up a little and may be open for tourists as early as next year.
The other thing that struck me about some of the places we visited that day were how briefly the spots we stood that day actually appeared in the show. We stopped at a couple of points both at Castle Ward and later at Tollymore Forest Park where scenes less than 15 seconds or so in duration were filmed. I felt a little foolish being with a group of 30 or so people watching a clip of Tyrion Lannister and Bronn walking in the woods and talking for less than 20 seconds. We came all this way to see where less than 20 seconds of film were shot??? All told, outside of Castle Ward / Winterfell itself our contact with show locations in all eight plus hours we were on the road totaled probably way less than 30 minutes.
However, I will admit there was a thrill when Robbie took us to the hanging tree, the spot where Brienne of Tarth and Jamie Lannister stumble across some House Stark men who have just hanged three women for cavorting with Lannister soldiers. This was clearly a recognizable unadulterated spot where a scene in the show happened. Pretty cool. Even if it was less than 30 seconds. Brienne killed all the Stark soldiers by the way.
I also loved the spot where the Starks found the direwolf pups is the very first episode. Not because that scene was especially important to me personally (although I guess one could argue that was an event that affected the entire rest of the series) but because there's a wooden bridge that the Stark children walk over to get to the dead direwolf mother that isn't there. HBO built the wooden bridge that they cross for the episode and then removed it. The bridge appears in exactly 24 seconds of the episode. Had to have that bridge!!!
The highlight of the day, though, was our visit to Inch Abbey, a ruined Cistercian monastery first built in the late 12th century, where the lords of the North declared Robb Stark as King in the North. Was it the historic importance of the Abbey or the character of the Norman architecture that made this place special? No it was not. It was that we got to dress up in cloaks and play with swords. Yes, the highlight of my day in Northern Ireland was dressing up and playing soldier. And yes, I'm 51 years old!!!!
Did you know there's a procedure for donning a cloak? I figured it was just slung over your shoulders and tied in front of the neck, although after wearing an actual cloak I could see that method of wearing one of these garments being a strangulation hazard. Take the long part of the strap, pass it around your body and then fasten it to the buckled end of the short part of the strap. How people moved quickly with these things on is beyond me, let alone fight with swords. It was warm, though. Which I guess is part of the point.
Cloak on, sword in hand, our entire party (some with Stark banners) made the short walk to the Abbey itself for a group and individual photo ops. Crazy stuff that this is how I spent an afternoon on my vacation. It was completely silly and tons of fun. Add this to the list of things that I never thought I'd do on my travels around the world. I can't imagine what the legitimate tourists visiting the Abbey that we passed on our way thought was going on.
If it seems from everything I've covered in this post like there's a whole industry of tourism that has developed over the last five or ten years in Ireland just related to Game of Thrones, you'd be right. There is. I asked Robbie how many days a week he brings people to Winterfell and his response was that it's his full time job. I figured this was a side gig. It's not. For him, it's his career. I'm jealous in a way.
It's also clear from visiting the Dark Hedges first thing in the morning and not being the first ones there, and being turned away from the lunch serving at the Fullerton Arms because there were too many Game of Thrones tour buses with standing reservations that this show has affected the economy of Northern Ireland and the lives of those involved in catering to nerds like me in immeasurable ways. I wrote earlier in this post that this sort of tourist attraction seems manufactured and inauthentic. It certainly isn't to those living it and making money from it every day. If you are in any way a fan of the show and are visiting Belfast, I'd definitely recommend signing up for one of these tours and embracing everything it can be.
All told, we probably spent about two whole days tracking down Game of Thrones related stuff in Northern Ireland. We could have done way more if we'd wanted to. If we had visited a year later, we would have done more. Next year (in addition to the aforementioned actually replica of Winterfell), HBO is launching the Game of Thrones Studio Tour in Belfast. We definitely would have done that.
While it's a little unlucky that we missed the Studio Tour and Winterfell by visiting this year, we did have a little GOT-related luck on this trip. There is a touring exhibition of artifacts from the show that's making its way around the world (or at least Europe). It's already been to Barcelona, Paris, Oberhausen and is currently (as of the date of this post) en route to Madrid for a late October opening. Between Oberhausen and Madrid, it was in Belfast and was scheduled to wrap up on September 1, two days before we were scheduled to arrive in Belfast. Bad luck again, it would seem.
But then in August, it was announced that the exhibit would be extended for one more week. What luck! Perfect for us! Want to see props like dragon skulls, statues from the crypt in Winterfell and actual swords and clothing used in the show? Go find this exhibit. While it's probably not worth making a special trip all the way to Madrid to see this stuff, if you are there and you are a fan, I'd recommend paying what might seem like an ungodly amount of money to spend a couple of hours at this thing. We did. I'd say it was worth it and provided us with just one more way we managed to make this a true pilgrimage. There I go again with the whole pilgrimage thing.
I often take trips that look at a single subject from a number of different viewpoints. We visited several different Gaudí buildings in Barcelona in 2014 and took in what seemed like innumerable temples and shrines in Japan three years after that. These types of explorations allow me to get more than one take on a single subject and add up to a richer examination of something important to me. I just never thought I'd do it for a television show. Totally worth it though.
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| The Dark Hedges, also known as the King's Road. |
Belfast is Game of Thrones central. No pilgrimage (am I really ready to call what I did a pilgrimage?) of this sort could skip the capital city of Northern Ireland. We started our journey there on our very first day after crossing into the United Kingdom on the recently installed Glass of Thrones trail. You thought the title of this post was stupid...just wait.
Glass of Thrones, I say? I do! The final season of this exalted series featured just six episodes. On the air date of each of those last six, one giant stained glass window was unveiled at six different locations around Belfast by Tourism Ireland. All six together formed a sequence from City Hall over the River Farset to all the way north of Titanic Belfast. About a mile and a half or maybe a bit more overall in length. They are still there. Instant tourist attraction!! And of course, we had to do all six, one for each of the four central houses in the show (Stark, Lannister, Baratheon and Targaryen) plus another for the white walkers and one final one for the Iron Throne.
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| Glass of Thrones number five: White Walkers. With Titanic Belfast in the background. |
Make it to the fifth Glass and you'll find Hodor holding the door against the onslaught of wights fighting to get to Brandon Stark, freshly anointed as the brand new three-eyed raven. If there's a more poignant character in the entire series than Hodor, I don't know who it is. That part of the story brings me closer to tears than any other plot line in any of the eight seasons.
Keep going to the end of the trail and you'll find the Iron Throne waiting for you. Or at least a tractor seat in front of the stained glass depiction of the Iron Throne. It's an inventive touch to add this seat in front of the last backdrop. Plus, after a mile and a half or so, a place to sit is welcomed, especially if it's been raining most of the way along your journey (like it was for ours!). Glass of Thrones done.
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| Clockwise from top left: Jon Snow, Tyrion with crossbow, poor Hodor and Dany with the baby dragons. |
Not familiar with Door of Thrones? I'm not surprised. Turns out that during the filming of the series, some of the trees that flank the King's Road were felled in a storm. Yes, the King's Road is real although it's called the Dark Hedges in real life. We visited that site on the way up to the Giant's Causeway on our second day in Northern Ireland.
Anyway, rather than just cut the downed beeches up for firewood, HBO bought the trees and had doors made out of them, complete with bas reliefs of scenes from the show's history. There are a total of ten of these things. Together, they constitute the Door of Thrones set. And you'll have to travel far and wide to see them all. We found two: one at the Fullerton Arms pub in Ballycastle and one at The Cuan (pronounced queue-ann) pub in Strangford.
The Cuan owns door number one, which shows a map of Westeros, and the Fullerton Arms owns door number six, which shows a dragon (presumably Drogon, the biggest of the three). During a stop for lunch, we managed to talk to one of the owners of The Cuan about how they acquired their door. It was apparently offered to them as a gift of thanks for housing most of the stars of House Stark along with Lena Headey during the filming of the Winterfell scenes in the early seasons of the series. I imagine the Fullerton Arms might have a similar story (if we had been allowed to stay long enough to ask them) since that pub is near Ballintoy where some of the scenes of the Iron Islands were filmed.
I think this is a pretty cool gesture from the network. If nothing else it perpetuates a constant trail of geeks like me (and worse!) visiting the places that supported the show during filming. We stopped our Door of Thrones visits at two, although we could have easily hit the one in a Belfast coffee shop if we had wanted. Two was enough I think.
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| The Cuan's Door of Thrones No. 1. |
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| Detail from Door of Thrones No. 6 at the Fullerton Arms, showing Drogon. |
What's so special about Game of Thrones Tours? Well, if you are a fan of the show, pretty much everything. They offer a series of tours out of Belfast, Dublin or Derry which really amount to two different itineraries. The first is a trip to the north coast of Northern Ireland to see filming locations for the Iron Islands along with the Giant's Causeway (which is NOT in Game of Thrones). The second is a trip south of Belfast to visit Winterfell (yes THE Winterfell) and some other locations in the North associated with House Stark. After all, House Stark is hands down the best house in the series.
There's one more twist to Game of Thrones Tours' agenda: your tour will be led by someone who was actually in the show. No, you won't get Peter Dinklage or Kit Harrington or Emilia Clarke sitting at the front of your bus playing DVDs and providing their personal narrative of their experiences on the show. You won't even get Liam Cunningham (Ser Davos Seaworth) or Jacob Anderson (Grey Worm) or someone like that. All those people I'm sure are either looking for their next gig or spending time on the Comic-Con tour circuit.
Think "extras".
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| Castle Audley, otherwise known as one half of the Twins. |
Just a bit more about Robbie (indulge me, OK?). He got involved in the show because HBO was looking for trained archers to be part of the cast and he was in a local archery club. Now, realistically speaking, HBO could have faked this, right? I mean it's not like we as viewers would pick up on the fact that trained archers were in the episodes, right? They could have just CGI-ed it or shot it in a way that showed arrows in the sky shot by off camera personnel. But they insisted on using extras that knew how to handle a bow and arrow.
Robbie first attended a casting call for applicants that he figured would be attended by 20 or 30 people (there were hundreds). He passed that audition but only if he spent the next four months growing out his hair and beard (he's working retail at this point but does what the network asks). Four months later (and with a full beard and long hair), he's back shooting arrows at a target for HBO. No accuracy, no part in the show. Fortunately, Robbie's not just in the archery club, he's the coach. He passes and makes it into the show.
For me this narrative is useful for two reasons. First, it shows the lengths that HBO went to get the details right in this series (let's ignore the water bottle and coffee cup in the last season, shall we?). They didn't have to have trained archers in the Battle of the Blackwater but they did anyway. Second, I think it's awesome that Robbie's life was changed completely by chance. He happened to have an interest in archery that translated into an entire new career path based on a television show. How cool is that?
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| Me. Cloak. Long claw. No glasses in Game of Thrones. Oh well... |
Of course when you get to the places where the show was filmed, you don't necessarily see the same structures and scenes you see in the show. Yes, the season one courtyard scenes at Winterfell were shot in the courtyard of Castle Ward but there's only one tower at Castle Ward vs. two at Winterfell and the balconies where Ned and Catelyn Stark watched Bran struggle with bow and arrow target practice are not there at all. The reasons for this are simple: the second tower was added by computer and the balconies were added for the show and then disassembled. After all, Castle Ward is an historic site and legit tourist attraction not related to Game of Thrones. They can't just leave something added by a television network.
I have to say it was a little disappointing. I wanted to see Winterfell and just assumed that Castle Ward would way more resemble the Stark home than it actually did. One of the reasons I assume this was that Winterfell was in play in every season. Heck, the Night King led a siege on Winterfell in season eight. But Robbie pointed out that when Theon Greyjoy captured Winterfell, he set fire to the place. And you can't very well set Castle Ward on fire, now can you?
HBO's solution to this dilemma was to build a full size replica of Winterfell elsewhere in Northern Ireland. Most scenes in Winterfell after the first or second season were therefore filmed on the fake Winterfell (or is it the real one?) built especially for the show. That location is off limits. For now. It's allegedly being fixed up a little and may be open for tourists as early as next year.
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| Robbie showing us the magic of television. Comparing real life Castle Ward to fictional Winterfell... |
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| and elsewhere on the property at the hanging tree where Brienne of Tarth got into it with some Stark soldiers. |
However, I will admit there was a thrill when Robbie took us to the hanging tree, the spot where Brienne of Tarth and Jamie Lannister stumble across some House Stark men who have just hanged three women for cavorting with Lannister soldiers. This was clearly a recognizable unadulterated spot where a scene in the show happened. Pretty cool. Even if it was less than 30 seconds. Brienne killed all the Stark soldiers by the way.
I also loved the spot where the Starks found the direwolf pups is the very first episode. Not because that scene was especially important to me personally (although I guess one could argue that was an event that affected the entire rest of the series) but because there's a wooden bridge that the Stark children walk over to get to the dead direwolf mother that isn't there. HBO built the wooden bridge that they cross for the episode and then removed it. The bridge appears in exactly 24 seconds of the episode. Had to have that bridge!!!
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| Our fearless leader Robbie showing us where the dire wolf pups were found... |
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| and proving to us that he was actually in the show. |
Did you know there's a procedure for donning a cloak? I figured it was just slung over your shoulders and tied in front of the neck, although after wearing an actual cloak I could see that method of wearing one of these garments being a strangulation hazard. Take the long part of the strap, pass it around your body and then fasten it to the buckled end of the short part of the strap. How people moved quickly with these things on is beyond me, let alone fight with swords. It was warm, though. Which I guess is part of the point.
Cloak on, sword in hand, our entire party (some with Stark banners) made the short walk to the Abbey itself for a group and individual photo ops. Crazy stuff that this is how I spent an afternoon on my vacation. It was completely silly and tons of fun. Add this to the list of things that I never thought I'd do on my travels around the world. I can't imagine what the legitimate tourists visiting the Abbey that we passed on our way thought was going on.
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| The promenade to Inch Abbey. |
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| Nothing like dressing up and playing with swords on vacation. |
It's also clear from visiting the Dark Hedges first thing in the morning and not being the first ones there, and being turned away from the lunch serving at the Fullerton Arms because there were too many Game of Thrones tour buses with standing reservations that this show has affected the economy of Northern Ireland and the lives of those involved in catering to nerds like me in immeasurable ways. I wrote earlier in this post that this sort of tourist attraction seems manufactured and inauthentic. It certainly isn't to those living it and making money from it every day. If you are in any way a fan of the show and are visiting Belfast, I'd definitely recommend signing up for one of these tours and embracing everything it can be.
All told, we probably spent about two whole days tracking down Game of Thrones related stuff in Northern Ireland. We could have done way more if we'd wanted to. If we had visited a year later, we would have done more. Next year (in addition to the aforementioned actually replica of Winterfell), HBO is launching the Game of Thrones Studio Tour in Belfast. We definitely would have done that.
While it's a little unlucky that we missed the Studio Tour and Winterfell by visiting this year, we did have a little GOT-related luck on this trip. There is a touring exhibition of artifacts from the show that's making its way around the world (or at least Europe). It's already been to Barcelona, Paris, Oberhausen and is currently (as of the date of this post) en route to Madrid for a late October opening. Between Oberhausen and Madrid, it was in Belfast and was scheduled to wrap up on September 1, two days before we were scheduled to arrive in Belfast. Bad luck again, it would seem.
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| Dragon skull from Game of Throne: The Touring Exhibition. |
I often take trips that look at a single subject from a number of different viewpoints. We visited several different Gaudí buildings in Barcelona in 2014 and took in what seemed like innumerable temples and shrines in Japan three years after that. These types of explorations allow me to get more than one take on a single subject and add up to a richer examination of something important to me. I just never thought I'd do it for a television show. Totally worth it though.
How We Did It
There's a lot to unpack here.
You can find each of the six Glass of Thrones windows by opening up Google Maps and typing "glass of thrones belfast". Each of the six windows will appear on the map stretching from Belfast City Hall to north of Titanic Belfast. Simple, right? Alternately, you can find information about all six along with a map on the visitBelfast.com tourist page. The link is here.
If you want a comprehensive page for all things Game of Thrones in Northern Ireland, try the Discover Northern Ireland website. They have a whole page devoted to tours and sights related to the show. You'll find (once again) information about Glass of Thrones as well as all ten Door of Thrones locations and beyond. Of course, they've developed an app showing you how to get to about every publicly accessible filming spot.
If you want more information about the Fullerton Arms or The Cuan where we saw Door of Thrones Nos. 1 and 6, check out their websites. Click the name of each in the previous sentence to access each pub's website. If you go to the Fullerton Arms on your own, make a reservation or be prepared to be turned away. We were. There were two tour buses already parked out front when we got there at a little after 1 p.m. and we saw another pulling in as we departed with empty stomachs. You will likely not have the same issue at The Cuan.
If you want to visit the King's Road on your own (as we did), search for the Dark Hedges on Google Maps to find the location but don't actually drive to that spot. The actual road with the trees is closed to traffic and there's no space to park right outside. Instead, drive to the The Hedges Hotel just about a quarter mile from the King's Road itself and park there and walk. It's OK to do this. They encourage it. There's also a Dark Hedges Experience which involves guided tours in the day and night times. We didn't do this but it departs from the Dark Hedges Estate just a little further down the road from The Hedges Hotel. The webpage for the Experience is here.
Finally, I'd very much encourage you to book a tour with Game of Thrones Tours. Their Winterfell Tour departs from the Jurys Inn in Belfast's city centre at 8:30 a.m. They do not operate daily so check the schedule of available tours on their website. I've covered some but not all of the locations where they will take you. While you could try to patch it together yourself, I'd recommend you book with them and let them do all the hard work. Besides, if you do it yourself, you won't meet any direwolves on the tour. We met Summer and Greywind!
Whatever you do in Northern Ireland related to Game of Thrones, I hope you have as much fun as we did. Valar Morghulis!
You can find each of the six Glass of Thrones windows by opening up Google Maps and typing "glass of thrones belfast". Each of the six windows will appear on the map stretching from Belfast City Hall to north of Titanic Belfast. Simple, right? Alternately, you can find information about all six along with a map on the visitBelfast.com tourist page. The link is here.
If you want a comprehensive page for all things Game of Thrones in Northern Ireland, try the Discover Northern Ireland website. They have a whole page devoted to tours and sights related to the show. You'll find (once again) information about Glass of Thrones as well as all ten Door of Thrones locations and beyond. Of course, they've developed an app showing you how to get to about every publicly accessible filming spot.
If you want more information about the Fullerton Arms or The Cuan where we saw Door of Thrones Nos. 1 and 6, check out their websites. Click the name of each in the previous sentence to access each pub's website. If you go to the Fullerton Arms on your own, make a reservation or be prepared to be turned away. We were. There were two tour buses already parked out front when we got there at a little after 1 p.m. and we saw another pulling in as we departed with empty stomachs. You will likely not have the same issue at The Cuan.
If you want to visit the King's Road on your own (as we did), search for the Dark Hedges on Google Maps to find the location but don't actually drive to that spot. The actual road with the trees is closed to traffic and there's no space to park right outside. Instead, drive to the The Hedges Hotel just about a quarter mile from the King's Road itself and park there and walk. It's OK to do this. They encourage it. There's also a Dark Hedges Experience which involves guided tours in the day and night times. We didn't do this but it departs from the Dark Hedges Estate just a little further down the road from The Hedges Hotel. The webpage for the Experience is here.
Finally, I'd very much encourage you to book a tour with Game of Thrones Tours. Their Winterfell Tour departs from the Jurys Inn in Belfast's city centre at 8:30 a.m. They do not operate daily so check the schedule of available tours on their website. I've covered some but not all of the locations where they will take you. While you could try to patch it together yourself, I'd recommend you book with them and let them do all the hard work. Besides, if you do it yourself, you won't meet any direwolves on the tour. We met Summer and Greywind!
Whatever you do in Northern Ireland related to Game of Thrones, I hope you have as much fun as we did. Valar Morghulis!
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