History of Belfast Tours

DC Tours run award-winning city centre walking tours and a range of self-guided audio tours. You can join their ‘A History of Terror’ tour where your expert guide explains how and why the Troubles started. Over two hours and 15 minutes you visit seven locations in the city centre where some of the most important events of the conflict occurred. Or opt for the ‘Best of Belfast Walking Tour’ which is the perfect two hour introduction to Belfast and its unique past. Along the way you will discover fantastic street art, beautiful architecture, amazing history and the unique stories of Belfast’s citizens throughout the centuries.

If you prefer a self guided tour, download the ‘DC Tours Belfast’ app. This range of free and premium self-guided tours are packed full of historical information, pictures, audio and video, with a GPS mapping system allowing you to take total control of your experience.

The history of Belfast begins at Clifton House! From the moment you step through the door you will be transported back in time to the Belfast Poor House – opened in 1774 – which provided sanctuary to thousands of people, from the young and old, to local citizens and passing sailors, throughout the years. With their augmented reality, visitors can now fully immerse themselves in what life was like in the late eighteenth century. During this tour you will visit Clifton Street Cemetery and see the final resting place of radicals including Henry Joy and Mary Ann McCracken, Thomas McCabe & William Drennan; poets and artists; American slaves; and wealthy families buried alongside one of the largest famine graveyards in Ireland.

Discover Belfast in a sustainable and eco friendly way. Hear of the Belfast humble beginnings, its troubled past. Yet rise to be a global leader in its own right. You can choose from a selection of tours or a bespoke one to suit the assembled group.

Marti will take you on a wee dander (as we say around here) through the city he grew up in, and as you go on a voyage of discovery, he’ll paint a picture off its past, present and future. Noted for it’s marvelous architecture, renowned for it’s shipbuilding, and praised for it’s attempts to bring peace to it’s people.

Belfast Free Walking Tour is the only local, independent free tour company in Belfast, and all of the guides love to share their city and its stories with visitors. Belfast is one of the most vibrant, historical and up-and-coming cities in Europe.

On the tour, explore the history of the city and its people, visiting iconic landmarks and discuss Belfast’s troubled history, languages, culture, the 1798 rebellions, legends and folklore and much more.

Experience a one hour walking tour including a walk around the Titanic Slipways and inside the Titanic Belfast building. Stand where Titanic once proudly overlooked the city from her slipway, listen to passenger stories, celebrate the architectural wonder that is Titanic Belfast and learn about the wider Titanic Quarter and its remarkable regeneration.

This one-hour tour, which complements a visit to the nine interactive galleries inside Titanic Belfast, will also feature discussion on the Drawing Offices, where Thomas Andrews and his colleagues designed Titanic and the Olympic Class liners, and their history and importance.

Take a tour through Belfast City centre and hear stories of interesting, unusual and entertaining events that have happened in Belfast over the last 150 years. Every building in every city has a story to tell and Belfast is no different. Join this leisurely 2 hour walk through the city, billed as “the most entertaining tour in Belfast”.

Belfast Hidden Tours explore the city’s art, history, politics and culture by walking the streets, meeting local people and enjoying the craic! Learn about Belfast’s history as a centre of trade, industry and culture through the ages. From its role in the formation of the United Irishmen and the 1798 Rebellion, to the horrific loss of life during the Belfast Blitz of 1941 and the 30 years leading up to the Good Friday Peace Agreement of 1998, locally known as The Troubles.

The Black Cab Tour will show you some the key points of ‘The Troubles’ using local murals. Travel through the areas you’ve seen on television exploring the murals on both sides of the community, Loyalist and Republican from a historical perspective.

Using a detailed map, uncover the story of the Titanic as you journey from the Titanic Memorial Garden at Belfast City Hall, through the city to the Titanic Quarter. You will discover a number of the key Titanic and maritime heritage attractions including SS Nomadic, Harland & Wolff Drawing Offices, Titanic Belfast, Titanic and Olympic Slipways, and Titanic’s Dock and Pump-House.

The free, self-guided Titanic Trail is available to download on your mobile device.

Take a unique walking tour delivered by former political prisoners who share their personal experiences of the British/Irish conflict. Experience authentic tours, delivered by trained guides where you will explore the richness of the history and culture of West Belfast murals and more. All Coiste guides are political ex-prisoner of the republican community and will share their particular perspectives on the history of the area they grew-up in.

This political exchange would have been unheard of until very recently and is a fascinating way to spend a few hours with those who have first-hand experience of the British/Irish conflict

Travel back in time with Cairde na Cille (Friends of the Churchyard) through Victorian and Georgian Belfast, the Middle Ages and into the Land of Saints, Scholars, Sinners and Pagans! Friar’s Bush Cemetery has it all! Belfast’s most ancient burial place at Baile Bhaile na mBráithre offers Belfast’s closest connection to traditional Celtic Ireland of myth, music and legend.

Hometown Tours provides fun and memorable guided bike and walking tours along the cycle paths and greenways of Belfast with local expert Steven Patterson. Learn about Belfast, its history, the people who live here and the plans for its future while getting a real sense of the living city. Have fun and create great memories of your time in Belfast with their three hour bike tours which travel along flat, traffic-free cycle paths and stop for refreshments and plenty of photos along the way.

Dr Tom’s Tours specialises in leading guided walking tours that explore the complex and confusing history of Belfast, with particular expertise on the city’s political, social, medical and conflict history.

There is a range of tours on offer. You can learn about the people and places which helped shaped Belfast’s history, as well as being guided through different era’s of history, from the 1750s to the Second World War.

Belfast Sightseeing guides have a full knowledge of the British / Irish conflict and can give you an in-depth tour of the murals and their reason for being. Your informative and educated guide will have you walk these streets with scars of bullet holes and old army barracks. Their tour is 90 minutes long.