Ulster Rambles BY DAVID MACCONNELL
I was reading the newspaper yesterday and after my useless search for any good news, I looked at what exciting program might be on the tele, and to my surprise there was one new serial on SBS which had been filmed in Ulster, County Down, or to be more precise, the area around Strangford Lough, which at one time I knew so well. When an expensive car is pulled from Strangford Lough, veteran Northern Ireland police detective Tom Brannick (James Nesbitt) instantly sees the connection to a notorious and long-buried series of mysterious disappearances. He recognises the calling card (an image of the Harland and Wolf crane) of a legendary assassin known as Goliath. It’s a case that comes from Tom’s - and his country’s - dark past. The series is called Bloodlands. Apparently it has already been viewed in the U.S. and in Canada and it stirred up quite a few memories of the Province for me. Now that I have resided in Australia for the last forty years, I know that Ulster and even Ireland are not large areas but I was very familiar with the area shown above on the map. Well I was born in Downpatrick, lived in Shrigley, went to school in Killyleagh, was a teenager in Newtownards, sold the family home in Bangor, cycled and drove all around that area during the late sixties and lastly my parents are both buried overlooking the Lough. Because of the very narrow inlet, the tide had a significant effect on Strangford Lough which consequently had many treacherous currents. Of course all these small towns were very close to the capital so very few inhabitants from the area actual spent much time in the Belfast hotels. I probably do not know anyone who spent a night in one of these hotels. There was another reason as well! 58 | THE IRISH SCENE
The most famous one of course is the Europa Hotel. Built on the site of the Great Northern Railway Station, it dates back to 1971. During the next twenty years, it became the hang-out for journalists from all over the world, with the hotel itself often making the headlines. It officially joined Hastings Hotels in August 1993 and after a major refurbishment, reopened its doors in February 1994. It is classed as a four star hotel and is best known as the “most bombed hotel in Europe” and the “most bombed hotel in the world” after having suffered 36 bomb attacks during the time of conflict between certain factions. It thus earned the name “the Hardboard Hotel” due to the fact that there was a standing order with a warehouse that had every pane of glass duplicated or triplicated, so they could be immediately replaced, as the windows got blown numerous times, the steel frames got warped, so they had to cover them up with hardboard instead. Grand Met bought the Inter-Continental Hotels chain in 1981 and placed the Europa in their Forum hotels division. They renamed the hotel
