This is my last last day in the North and it opened up with rain. Lots of it. Luckily it died off just before 10.00 and I decided to start the day with an open top tour of Belfast. I had no clue where I was going and felt the bus tour would give me some ideas.

Within 5 minutes almost everyone had emptied off the bus at the Titanic exhibition. It didn’t interest me much so I stayed on vowing to do the whole circle and then deciding where to visit for the day.

Soon we took a trip out of town to Stormont which is the seat of the Northern Ireland government.

There are lots of lovely buildings from the 19th and early 20th Century in Belfast and this one is no exception. It is 365 feet wide, and has 365 windows (I was actually listening to the tour guide). The six pillars at the front represent the six counties of Northern Ireland.

It was going to sport a dome like the Whitehouse but the stock market crash of 1929 reduced the investment available, so I’m afraid you will just have to use your imagination on what it would have looked like.

Moving up the Crumlin Road, the old law courts. A new law courts has been built near the centre of town in glass as they can now make glass buildings in Belfast.

The old law courts were sold on eBay and bought by a local investor for £1. He hasn’t had the money to renovate it, and it’s now a real mess. The government is interested buying it back but the investor wants to keep it.

Not far from Crumlin Road you get to the Shankhill Road area of Belfast.

Murals are still very much alive and well in Belfast. Some are dedicated to peaceful aims. Some, like this one, depict paramilitary groups.

Not far from the Protestant Shankhill Road area is the Catholic Falls Road area. These two areas of West Belfast have been split by a large peace wall.

Apparently dozens of world leaders have written words of wisdom on here. However, millions of other people have written their words of wisdom (and some not so wise) on here, obscuring the global messages.

On the other side of the wall is the Falls Road area. There is a Remembrance Garden to Provisional IRA members who were killed and, like the Shankhill area, an abundance of murals.

This is the most photographed mural in the world and depicts the hunger striker, Bobby Sands.

After the bus tour, I ended up back in the centre of town where I started and went looking for lunch. Eating out in Derry and Belfast is inexpensive and there’s lots of choice. I had a boxed noodle meal with chips, chicken in black bean sauce and sweet and sour chicken. £5 for the lot, eat in.

I had made my mind up that a visit to the Crumlin Road Gaol would occupy a large chunk of my afternoon. The bus timetables were a nightmare so I gave up and walked there.

The tours run every 15 minutes so I didn’t have long to wait before my slot came up. This was a working jail up until 1996, conditions are Victorian with no toilets in the rooms etc.

This is one room you don’t want to end up in. 17 prisoners were executed here during the lifetime of the prison, the last in 1961.

Apparently, it’s the only fully functioning gallows of its kind still present in the UK.

I’ll finish off the picture round with a shot of Belfast City Hall. Had I turned up weekdays I would have had a free guided tour. They only run two at set times on Saturday and none at all on Sunday so I couldn’t fit it in – maybe next time.

Talking of next time, I will definitely be taking another tour to Belfast sometime. There is simply so much to see here; like Derry the people are very friendly and the atmosphere is very upbeat now that peace has descended on the region.

Trip Advisor lists over 170 attractions for Belfast so you could stay here for weeks and still not run out of things to do.