Today, our last day with driver/guide David, we traveled a standard tourist route: the Antrim Coast of extreme Northern Ireland, just a stone’s throw south of Scotland. We made the usual stops and tourist route or not, the scenery was great. Just like all the scenery we’ve enjoyed in Ireland, but still unique in its own way.
I mentioned to David that I somehow had a feeling that we were in England, not Ireland. He said he had the same feeling. Maybe it’s the houses. In Ireland, they are usually painted in bright, cheerful colors. In Northern Ireland they are white, grey and maybe a hint of color here in there. More Victorian architecture, too. More like what a British Loyalist would prefer. But maybe it’s just a figment of our imaginations.
First stop: Dunluce Castle. Talk about bickering and squabbles and mistrust. Starting in the 1550s, the MacDonnells ousted the MacQuillans. The MacDonnells fought continually with their neighbors. Queen Elizabeth got nervous with all these Scotsmen threatening to claim kingship over her claims. She took over the castle but soon gave it back to the MacDonnells after they pleaded loyalty to the crown. Then Oliver Cromwell, after beheading Charles I, took the castle and its lands and granted them in the 1650s as a reward to soldiers who had fought for him in Ireland. The castle was never the same. Even though the MacDonnells eventually regained it, they never fixed it up. It became property of the State in 1928. You can see the piles of rock, clinging to the walls of the cliffs, in today’s pictures. We hear that what used to be the castle’s kitchen recently fell into the ocean.
Next, the Giant’s Causeway. Here we have two stories to tell: the geologist’s story and the Irish folk tale story. We report. You decide.
Fifty million years ago, give or take, this area was subject to heavy volcanic activity. The result was formation of 40,000 basalt columns, 12 meters or so in length. Today, it’s a World Heritage Site.
Yawn.
Do you remember Finn MacCool from the Gráinne’s Cave legend? The guy whose girlfriend ran off with his right-hand man? Turns out he shows up in folklore a lot in Ireland and Scotland. Today, he’s transformed himself into a giant and has built steppingstones in the ocean to reach Scotland. Benandonner, a giant from Scotland, much bigger than MacCool, crosses the steppingstones with the aim of fighting MacCool.
MacCool is worried – he can’t fight such a big giant. So MacCool’s wife dresses him as a baby and puts him to bed. Benandonner comes to the house, takes one look at “baby” MacCool and figures if MacCool’s baby is that big, he doesn’t stand a chance. So he high tails it back to Scotland, pulling up the steppingstones as he goes.
Now there’s a story you can hang your hat on.
Carrick-a-Rede is an island which, starting in the 1600s, was a prime spot for salmon fishing. In 1755 the fishermen built a rope bridge to make getting to the island easier. The fishing industry died in the 1960s when salmon were no longer plentiful. Today, the reconstructed bridge is open for tourists at 15 quid a pop.
David was smart. He knows his clientele. Before taking us to the bridge, he took us to a viewing platform to see the bridge in action from a distance See the pictures. One hundred foot drop? Fifteen smackers? Let’s go for lunch.
And lunch we did at a pub in nearby Ballycaste. We invited David to join us, which he did, and we hade great fish, fish stew, mussels and tobacco onions (really good string onions I would call them).
We made it to Belfast around 5 PM and found our new apartment after the most convoluted entry procedure ever. The lock box containing the key was strapped to a fence post in a vacant lot. The path to the apartment was described in a lengthy video. But here we are.
David is on his way to Dublin for his next group of guests arriving at 6 AM tomorrow. Judy and I went out for South Korean dumplings (a guy can eat only so much fish and chips in a day). Tomorrow it’s the Titanic museum, a Black Taxi tour with a survivor of The Troubles as our guide and then an afternoon exploring (and eating).
