Ireland ~ Giants Cuaseway & Derry (Day 7) 28Jul23

We left Belfast after breakfast for the Antrim Coast up north on the shore. We stopped in Carnlough, a cool beach town, for a brief break. We saw the crab catch being unloaded and walked around with a gob of other tourists but the town was very cool with a fleet of fishing and sailing boats, a nice town vibe, grass bowls court and tennis courts, and a stellar sculpture of geese. We were pretty quickly on our way.

We moved out along the northern Atlantic coast of Ireland and saw a largely undeveloped coastline dotted with sights like the keen residence on the beach at the bottom of a cliff (they get hammered), and the sheep grazing all over with the cliffed island right offshore. But the coolest spot was a castle from the 1500's overlooking the ocean. It is Dunluce Castle, an inspiration to CS Lewis and a filming site for the Game of Thrones. It was built by MacQuillan, conquered by MacDonnell Clan (Scots) and features the wrecks of the Spanish Armada on nearby rocks. Strategic for centuries and made of crumbling basalt.

Back on Kirstie's bus we headed for lunch in the small bay town of Port Ballintrae; we are still in the north and often see the British flag flying.

We left Ballintrae for the famous Giants Causeway and a hike, likely in the rain. It was a mobscene at the parking lot and the in the visitor's center but Kala and I chose the more challenging hike and soon enough lost most of the folks. This naturally unusual spot was a high cliff of basalt formed into hexagonally shaped columns. We hiked out a couple miles to the "castle spire" and "windy gap" and then descended many steps to a lower path below the cliffs to return to the starting point. We then hiked and stumbled on the hex footsteps and columns out a jutting point into the North Atlantic (so did many others). It was very cool.

Back on the bus, forget about us... headed back to Derry for some further walks in town. We saw the flags of Ulster on entry to a Unionist section and read the Scottish language poetry leading to the angel of Ulster. We also saw tributes to early activist and poet Octavia Hill. And we stopped at Bushmills distillery... we didn't tour but our guide shared a better bottle among our team and we convened outside. Fun.

We went back to the hotel and again went walking in Derry and caught more cool street art (including a mural to the Derry Girls; Netflix series), strolled the Derry Peace walking bridge, checked the gates (the Castle gate, a "recent" 1 of 7 now, with 4 originals) in this walled city originally intended to protect emigrating British citizens from the Irish bog-dwellers, saw the Derry City Hall (not a church ever!), and hit the diamond in town center displaying the monument to lost lives (purchased for a discount when other towns thought the impaling of a war enemy was "too much").

We headed back over the river for dinner at Shipquap and a nightcap at the Embrington Pub (mainly 'cause the "inside" music pubs were packed on Fri night).