So you might’ve noticed a new wee flyer on your table in Dock Cafe last week… it’s only the introduction of the new almighty amazing DOCK QUIZ!

Every week brings a new question, and a new prize.  The answers to every question can be found somewhere, somehow in Dock Cafe – so if you don’t know the answer straight away, a bit of detective work will get you there!

The questions – and the prizes – are all about exploring our beautiful Titanic Quarter and finding out more about our TQ neighbours

We’ve already got one winner – congrats Alora Todman, you’ve just won a game for 4 at Odyssey Bowl!  The answer (Queens Island was originally called Dargan’s Island) is on one of the info boards on the wall of the cafe.  (And will of course be instantly known to anyone who’s been on the Wee Tram!)

The next question is on the tables already – so get your thinking caps on…

Have you been in Dock Cafe recently?  It’s looking pretty smart!

As you can imagine, after the 5,500 customers who swung by during the Tall Ships weekend had left, both the volunteers and the cafe were looking a bit wrecked!

But nothing can stop the utter amazingness of the Dock team and the wonderful volunteers…  Over the 12th weekend the cafe was closed for a couple of days – but rather than taking the whole time to lie in a darkened room, James and the gang got to work on a refurb of the cafe.

Floor re-painted (you could eat your dinner off it now!), walls, painted, wobbly furniture fixed, artwork freshened up, lots of new furniture moved in to create new cosier corners, snazzy wooden floor fitted in the loo, and a nice coat of H&W yellow on the railings at the entrance – the place looks amazing!

(Thanks to our tweeting customers for some of the pics!)

If I thought I was proud of the team during the Tall Ships – the fact that they managed to muster the energy to do all this work the very next weekend is just breathtaking!

Call in soon to admire their handiwork – and make sure to say a wee word of thanks to the volunteers while you’re there.  What they’re doing is nothing short of miraculous.

Please note – Dock Cafe is closed for renovations and refurbishment (and – hey – maybe a wee holiday too?!) from Thursday 9th – Mon 13th July

But oh my word… what a July we’ve had so far.  We’ve figured out that Dock Cafe served 5,510 customers over four incredible days of Tall Ships, tremendous crowds and terrific fun:

Meanwhile, just a few doors along, the wonderful traders at Dock Market were similarly packed to the rafters with happy customers browsing their amazing selection of home-made hand-crafted goodness:

And on the Wee Tram – if we’d had twenty trams, we still couldn’t have squeezed everyone on board who wanted a ride!  What a weekend!

And what a perfect way to bring it to a close at our monthly Sunday Nights at The Dock service – chatting to ex-Lord Mayor Nichola Mallon about the signs of hope, vision and compassion she can see bubbling to the surface in Belfast, and giving thanks that we are living through these undreamt-of days in our city.

All of which leaves me at something of a loss for words to convey how grateful, humbled, impressed and in love I am with our amazing Dock volunteers, our incredible staff members, our lovely customers and the brilliant buzzing beautiful community we’re part of…

As Van the Man once sang, “Well my mama told me, there’ll be days like this”!

So here it is… the Tall Ships are here!

You’ve seen the adverts, you’ve heard the figures… fifty ships, half-a-million visitors, four days of glorious manic busy excitement in Belfast

And in the middle of it all – thanks to the utter wondrousness of our amazing team and volunteers – both Dock Cafe and Dock Market will be open for food, sanctuary, a friendly face and a nice refreshing cup of coffee

The DOCK Cafe

Thursday 2nd and Friday 3rd : 11am – 7pm
Saturday 4th : 10am – 7pm
Sunday 5th : 10am – 4pm

The DOCK Market

Thursday 2nd to Sunday 5th : 12 noon – late

Also the Wee Tram will be running a slightly different route this weekend to avoid the traffic jams – but still offering a fantastic way to see around the shipyard (at special discounted Tall Ships prices!):

And then when it’s all nearly over – Sunday night is the first Sunday of the month – so we’ll be gathering for Sunday Nights at the Dock at 6pm for worship, good news stories and a chance to give thanks together – and this week we’re welcoming Councillor Nichola Mallon as our special guest, to tell us all about the excitements of her year as Lord Mayor of Belfast.

See you there!

All my working worlds collided rather beautifully on Sunday morning – I got to simultaneously be a Dock Cafe barista, a Dock Chaplain and a Wee Tram conductor!

The event was the very moving launch of Lagan Search and Rescue, a brand-new purpose-built emergency response group for the Belfast Harbour area.  We’ve had informal links with these guys ever since Dock Cafe (in its very, very early state) provided a base for an emergency response operation back in early 2012 – but it was a huge privilege for the Dock Chaplaincy team to be asked to be the on-call Chaplains to the Lagan Search and Rescue team as they now become an official entity.

Speaking at the launch ceremony on the beautiful Titanic slipways on Sunday morning, Dock Chaplain Wes told of how his own Father was saved from drowning – and offered the support and time of the Dock Chaplains not just for those high-intensity situations when the Search and Rescue team would be called out, but also the quieter (but also possibly more difficult) days in between when the team need to process and talk about some of the things they’ve seen.

As the service finished the rain started to pour – so it really was perfect that we’d planned for the whole gathering to be transported to Dock Cafe by Wee Tram!  Everyone piled on board and we tootled off own the Queens Road to a waiting cuppa at The Dock.

And so to our wonderful shabby-chic sanctuary of a cafe, where the coffee and the conversation flowed.  Amongst many others I got to share a cuppa with Belfast’s Lord Lieutenant Finnouala Jay O’Boyle, meet some Lagan Dragons and meet some of the guys running the new Urban Sports park beside T13.

Another fantastic day, another link in the chain of the ever-growing but also ever-connecting world of the Titanic Quarter.  Another opportunity for the Dock Chaplains to play their part in this new community – in its darker days as well as its joyful ones.