Antrim Coast

Dunluce castle an hour before sunset

Last weekend we got three days off and we headed to Northern Ireland to explore the Antrim coast. It was a very rewarding trip and several of my pictures turned out quite well. I'm happy with the crop and you can see them all on my Picasa album.
I never thought I would live in Ireland or just hop in a car and drive to Northern Ireland. When I was still living in Switzerland, Ireland was in the News a lot. Usually with pictures from Belfast showing bloodshed and violence. Then it got quiet and I never thought much about it until I was offered a job here. The Troubles, as that period in history is called, are over. We didn't not go into Belfast on this trip -- three days is barely enough to explore the Northeast corner of this country; so that visit has to wait for another trip -- but there was nothing that bore any resemblance to the pictures I saw in the 1970s on the telly (TV for you Americans ;-)
The only indication that we had entered Northern Ireland was a sign offering the exchange of Euros to British pounds. The people in the North are as friendly as the people in the South, and the scenery is breathtaking throughout the island.

Causeway of the Giants

The main tourist attraction in the North is the Causeway of the Giants, a UNESCO world heritage site where volcanic lava cooled and crystallized into hexagonal columns of various heights; thereby creating large steps. The area is much smaller than its name implies, but definitely worth a visit. Some of my pictures are from the afternoon, but we went back for a few more around sunset when the place turned magical.

Mythology has it that the causeway extended all the way to Scotland so the giant Finn MacCool could walk over to visit is girlfriend on the island of Staffa. A struggle with another giant ensued and most of the causeway got stomped under water to break the connection between Scotland and Ireland.
Along the Northern coast are many other neat things to see. Dunluce castle at the beginning of this post is just one. The much smaller ruin of Dunseverick is also a pretty sight with all that green grass around it.

The remnants of the once important Dunseverick castle

We also walked on the beach of White Park Bay and visited the tiny harbor of Ballintoy. Each morning was overcast and sometimes drizzly, but the afternoons were beautiful. Well worth sleeping in a bit!

White Park Bay

Not far from there is the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge. With a cool name like that and an even cooler actual rope bridge to cross, who wouldn't. Well, maybe those skittish about the hight and the wobbliness high above the water. But just the walk to the bridge is nice and informative. You can see the island where misbehaving sheep were sent in exile, and even further out, the coast of Scotland.

Sheep island

The rope bridge used to be important for fishermen who would cross it to reach a small island where they could catch salmon. Now it is a tourist attraction that seemed to be more crowded than the Causeway of Giants.

The Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge

The salmon fishery on the island

Not only tourists, but birds as well, love the island, although they don't need the rope bridge to get there and would probably prefer it wasn't there.

Count the birds! Hint: not all of them have light gray backs.

Of course, we saw plenty of sheep on our trip, which is normal in Ireland, but we also saw Johann the goat in Cushendun.

Johann (click on the picture to enlarge the writing)

He seems to be used to stardom and gladly grants audiences.

Anika and Johann

On the last day of our trip we drove along the Mourne Mountains, snuck into the Narrow Water Castle keep even though it was closed to the public, and hiked in the Rostrevor Forest Park.

The Mourne Mountains

The great glacial boulder in Rostrevor Forest Park

Several of Lee Ann's ancestors were Irish and it is fun to find out where they used to live and why they emigrated to the New World. We visited several cemeteries to track down names that show up in her ancestry.com genealogy tree.

An ancestor of Lee Ann got married in St Malachy's Parish Church in Hillsborough in 1772

The Troubles are over and so are the hard times of protestant rule in the 1700s. Today Ireland struggles to recover from capitalism's harsh hand. It is nice to see that throughout the centuries and the hard times the country and its people have not lost their charm.