No visit to N. Ireland is complete without a visit to NED's Pub, (also known as The Maypole Bar.), one of the few, true original bars in Ireland.........  Maybe you will just drop in for a quick scoop of Guinness or the likes and a packet of Tayto (Irish for potato crisps).  On the other hand you may be there long enough to hear the familiar words, "last orders please", "time gentlemen please" and if you are having a really good time, "have you no homes to go to"..........There are also some rules to observe,

RULES

........The Maypole Bar (Ned's) was first licensed in 1857, and one of the most remarkable notes in it's history, is that since then right up to now, in the year 2007, there have only been 3 proprietors.................The first from 1857 until 1908, and the second from 1908 until 1967,  since when it has been in the Carty family.       Built in the 17th Century in Holywood Co. Down, beside Ireland's only existing, and still used Maypole. Many ships arriving in Belfast from overseas used sandstone as ballast, and it was sandstone brought in by ships from Ayrshire in Scotland that was used in many buildings in and around Belfast Lough including some in Holywood, of which The Maypole Bar (Ned's) is one.  Before the Cary family moved to Ne's they were the proprietors of the Star & Garter a Hotel and Bar at the bottom of Shore Street in the town. This beautiful old building was demolished to make way for the Holywood by-pass, and used to stand where the traffic lights are beside Warwick's old yard....See pictures below

LOCAL AREA

The town of Holywood, home to Ireland's only Maypole, is situated on the southern or Co. Down shore of Belfast Lough. To the south of the town are hills rising to a height of 659 feet with well wooded slopes. The town is about five miles from the centre of Belfast............Dominating the centre of the town is Ireland's only remaining Maypole, which dates back to 1700. An annual May Day Fair is held with market stalls, entertainment and traditional dances by local girls around the Maypole. During its annual Jazz and Blues Festival in June, a colourful New Orleans style band parades along High Street playing the jazz classic "When the Saints Go Marching In". This is highly appropriate as Holywood's foundations were laid by Saint Laiseran who founded an Abbey in the woods in AD620. His Celtic Abbey was later destroyed by Norman invaders and replaced by Holywood Priory built about 1190 as a daughter house of Bangor Abbey. From about 1615 to 1844 it was the Parish Church and the small tower dates from 1800. The Normans also built the Motte (off Church Road), one of a string of defensive mounds stretching the length of County Down from Holywood to Newry.The "Johnny the Jig" bronze statue can be seen outside the children's playground in the centre of the town. Created by the eminent Holywood sculptress Rosamund Praegar in the 1950's, it commemorates a boy killed on the roads and preaches the sanctity of children's lives.

The Star & Garter