A View from a Narnia Bench at Bangor Castle

A special request went out, a commission of sorts to help me finish my CS Lewis Narnia Trail. I needed some help and help came my way via facebook of all places.  When we were on holiday last month I did not get all the photos I would have liked of all the different places that CS Lewis is officially recognised in Northern Ireland.  So you can just imagine my delight  when two of my facebook friends offered to help and off they went and took the photos I requested.  So a big thankyou goes out to both of you.
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This very same spot is where CS Lewis used to sit with his friend Arthur Greeves looking out over Belfast Lough towards the Antrim Hills.

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From  Graham...... thankyou!

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From his favourite vantage point CS Lewis, saint and scholar from the County Down enjoyed a view of the countryside  and Belfast Lough after walking tours locally with his lifelong friend Arthur Greeves.

Devoted to his native County and Oxford University, CS Lewis loved both places.  His description of perfection recorded in "CS Lewis - at home  in Ireland" says it all:

"Heaven is Oxford lifted  and placed in the middle of County Down"

During 1998 North Down Heritage Centre made an important contribution to the C.S.  Lewis Centenary Celebration and here is that seat with the view from Bangor Heritage Centre at Bangor Castle.

From  Pastor Sam....... thankyou!

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and of the gardens and Castle which is now a small museum.
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From Pastor Sam.....thankyou!

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Pastor Sam has some more photos of Bangor on his flickr account.

If you have not seen my first 2 articles on the Real Life Narnia Trail you can read them at the following links:

• A Real Life Narnian Trail
• Giants, Stone Tables and Digory

Even those of you that have read them already will discover that I have added some  paintings to both of the articles since they were first published – including a painting of the Cloughmore Stone which interested quite a few of you.



I would also like to thank James O'Fee for linking to all of the Narnia series on leavesnbloom.  The main room in the Bangor Museum on Early Christian Ireland is named The Mary O'Fee Gallery with a plaque in his mothers memory.


He writes: 

Up till then the panorama must have been magnificent. Around 1972, however, with local government reorganisation, commercial interests obtained planning permission to erect a large building in the centre of the panorama for a department store. For many years the building was coloured an intrusive shade of pink. My mother, who was a local Councillor at the time, claimed that planning permission would never have been granted in normal times. The view that remains is appreciated best from the Humbert Craig Room in the Town Hall, where I've sat often myself on many committees.

You can read lots more detail of the story about the bench on his blog

My friend Amber is doing a 31 day series of quotes from CS Lewis:

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A man can no more diminish God's glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word, 'darkness' on the walls of his cell. CS Lewis

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