Tuesday, 2006-10-10 – Antrim County
We slept well and went out to breakfast about 8:30 am. Spring Farm B&B asked us to fill out a breakfast order form the night before, so we didn’t get so much food. The coffee was brewed, so I was quite happy.
As soon as we had eaten, we headed toward The Giant’s Causeway. Monday had been mostly sunny, and Tuesday looked as though it was going to be the same. Jack had picked the Spring Farm B&B because it was close to the Giant’s Causeway, and also to a golf course that he wanted to try.
The Giant’s Causeway had a few cars in the car park when we got there, though a tour bus arrived soon afterward. When I first drove in, I thought I was being directed to park on the grass, which seemed an odd choice in such a wet place. Then I noticed that we were parking on brick pavement, and the grass was growing up through the bricks.
We decided to walk the 1.5 kilometers to the Causeway, since it was downhill. There were a few other people, but once again we benefited from light crowds due to not traveling during the tourist season. I had worried that there would be a lot of things closed due to it being October, but we had no trouble finding places to go and eat whereever we were.
When we got to the formations, Jack and I split up, so he could scrambling on the rocks without me watching and worrying. I tried to get down to the tidal pools, but the rocks were too slippery for comfortable walking. One thing that surprised me is that there wasn’t as intensely briny a smell to the North Sea as I would have expected from being near other seashores.
We spent quite a while near the Causeway trying to identify various formations. I won’t try to describe the area: but I took lots of photos. The wikipedia link cited above gives an idea of the geological causes of the area. When we had finally had enough, we decided to take the bus back up to the Visitor’s Center, rather than walk. It seemed worth the pound trip fare.
I dropped Jack off at one of the links course at the Royal Port Rush Golf Club. (He didn’t play the more famous of the two courses, but said the course he did play was challenging enough.) I had decided that I would go see Dunluce castle, which we had passed on the way from The Giant’s Causeway to Portrush. This was the first time I had driven a car on the left side of the road without anyone else in the car, and doing so along a road that wound along the top of a cliff gave me an additional thrill.
Although Dunluce is a ruin, enough is left that one can get an idea of what it must have been like in its sixteen century heydey. There was also a model in the gatehouse of what the castle looked like at that time. Unfortunately, my fear of heights kept me from going across the causeway to the castle proper, which was a disappointment. (If I had been with Jack, he could probably have helped me across, since he is very good about being able to scout ahead and tell me whether I can handle something.) However, I did have a lot of fun taking photos of the castle from the landward side. Looking at Dunluce, it was impossible to believe that it was ever taken, though supposedly it was due to treachery.
Since Jack still had hours at the golf course, I decided to drive to Portrush and the surrounding countryside. After driving for a while south of Portrush(, I went back and managed to find a parking place near the business district, not far from the post office. (I parallel parked! I used to be a whiz at parallel parking when I lived in the Washington, DC area, but it is much different doing it on the “wrong” side of the road.) In a tea room next to the post office, I had a toffee brownie and coffee (brewed) while I wrote two postcards to send home. I mailed them (50 pence / 1 dollar a postcard) and then walked around Portrush for a while.
Portrush has mainly Victorian architecture, and several small marinas. It looks as though there has been a lot of fairly recent gentrification, as well as recent renovation of some of the old resort buildings. I walked for a while along what I would have called a boardwalk if it hadn’t been made of concrete. Although some places were closed due to the season, there was enough going on that it didn’t have the ghost town feeling that a lot of mid-Atlantic resorts get after September.
By this time my feet were killing me, and I decided to go back to the golf course and wait for Jack. Since this was the poor relation golf course, there was no snazzy lounge in which to wait, but I was able to sit in the car and read, while watching what seemed a constant stream of golfers ready to play the course. I was charmed (and surprised) to see that well-behaved dogs were allowed on the course, though there were stern signs warning golfers not to abuse the privlege.
Jack finished up before he had planned and joined me back at the car. I told him he ought to see Dunluce: even though it close at 4:00 pm in October, one could still park at the car park and see quite a lot of the castle from above. We drove there, and Jack started taking photos. I took a few more also. While we were there, a tour bus pulled up and out poured a horde of teenagers. I felt dissoriented when I realized that they had no accent, which meant they must be from the United States. I can’t imagine being foolhardy enough to take a bus of American adolescents along the north coast of Ireland. And wasn’t it the wrong time of year for a class trip? For five minutes, the teenagers mimed throwing each other over the parapet while I winced, and then they all dissappeared into the bus again, much to my relief. While I waited for Jack to finish taking photos, I felt something on my leg. I looked down and saw a beautiful border collie puppy, his feet planted on my thigh, looking back up at me. Fortunately, his owner called him back then, or I would have be seriously tempted to commit dognapping, despite the difficulty in having herding dogs around horses.
We decided to drive west along the coast and find some place to eat dinner. We stopped at several overlooks and ended up west of The Giant’s Causeway. I am not sure what made us decide to take the road to Balintoy harbor, but fortunately Jack was driving since we went down a road of very sharp switchbacks and signs warning that the road is not suitable for coaches or caravans. I’ve never been fond of driving when you can’t actually see where you are going: you are just taking the road on faith. However, Balintoy Harbor was worth the road: a small gem in the late afternoon sunshine. From the harbor, one could both look back to the east toward the Causeway, and north to some of the islands in the North Sea.
By then, I gave Jack my “if I don’t eat soon, I am going to get really cranky” warning, and we headed back to the B&B, deciding to go to yet another restaurant the landlady had recommended, in a hotel in a town 2 or 3 kilometers to the west of the B&B. We enjoyed our meal there: the prices seems a little more reasonable than the place we had eaten at the night before.
Jack wanted to go back the pub we had found the night before, so he dropped me off at the B&B on the way. I had a nice restful evening reading Wintersmith, and was pleased to have some downtime.
Written Saturday 2006-11-11
Sounds like fun!