Belfast and the Giant Causeway

On our second attempt we made it to Belfast and the Giant Causeway. It is hard to explain the magnificence of this area 'we went where giants have trod before' and I must admit it was easy to let your imagination run away. The stones are all heights (some up to my hips), flat on top so easy to walk over and many fairly geometric and smooth. The slightly stormy day, with rain showers, sunshine and wind created quite an atmosphere and we enjoyed it with the many other tourists and Irish who came out for the day. There isn't a lot more to say except that the Causeway is the only UNESCO World Heritage site in Ireland - so rather special. (New Zealand has 2 world heritage sites Te Wahipounamu (known to many of us as the Fiordlands) and The New Zealand Sub-Antarctic Islands (the Snares, Bounty Islands, Antipodes Islands, Auckland Islands and Campbell Island) - there's others waiting for classification like the volcanic area which I thought would have already been on it. Anyway, another wonderland to add to our WOW list...

1. Mt Kau Kau, Wellington
2. Cathedral, Milan
3. Giant Causeway, Northern Ireland
4. Newgrange, Ireland
5. Quantock Head, England
6. Food, Poland
7. Tower, Glasgow
8. Cemetery, Milan
9. Cycling in the Snow, Amsterdam
10. Walking the Cliffs of Dover, England
11. The Pavilion in Brighton, England
12. Waffles, Brussels
13. Hawkstone Park, England

There is something special about Ireland (North and South). There is a lot more colour in the towns, even though the buildings are all built from stone - they've been plastered and painted. There are more coloured cars rather than just the predominant grey and black we find on English roads, lots of flags flying in most towns (a new job for the Irish would be to climb the flag posts and untangle all the flags after a windy day) and a lot more colour in the clothes that people wear, reds, green and blue jackets scattered the causeway coast. As we walked along the coast we looked over to Rathlin Island - only 11 miles from Mull of Kintyre (Scotland) - the Beatles wrote a song that could explain this dramatic Irish coastline as well as the Scottish.

Mull of Kintyre

Oh mist rolling in from the sea,

My desire is always to be here

Oh Mull of Kintyre

Paul McCartney when writing the song imagined travelling away from the place he enjoyed living in and then wanting to go back there - I know that feeling. Anyway, there is a point to my jumping from Ireland to Scotland and back again over the North Sea. Once upon a time in the early 1600's Scotland and Ireland were debating who owned Rathlin Island. So, to settle the matter they took a snake to the island. St Patrick had expelled snakes from Ireland previously, and since no-one could argue with St Patrick when the snake died the island was deemed to be Irish!! (Knowing the weather in Scotland it could have equally died over there but the decision was Ireland's gain). We walked along the coastline for a few hours (not going as far as we would have liked due to the time it took to look and take photos). We passed where the Girona sank in the late 1500's - part of the Spanish Armada - only a handful of the 1300 on board survived. She was carrying valuables taken from other wrecked ships (was she overloaded?), and a lot of the treasure was not recovered until the 1960's. We had a look at the amphitheatre and vertical shafts of rock (rather large area looking a bit like a huge organ - one you play in a church is what I mean), and climbed 162 steps to the top of the coast for the walk back.

We then drove to Carrick-a-Rede Rope (a rock in the road) Bridge and enjoyed walking across the rope bridge which crosses an 18 metre gap between the mainland and a small island (which must have a name but I don't know it). Anyway, it is the old sea route for the Atlantic Salmon on their journey to Carrick Island and also a favourite haunt of fishermen for over 350 years when they hung a rope bridge across to access the best places to catch the fish on their travels. It was fun walking across above the swirling waves but I must admit I held on quite tightly as the wind gusted around us while 'no hands Harry' skipped across the bridge as though he was in training to become the next Billy Elliot.

It was a pleasant drive through little country villages (Bushmills had the quaintest fruit and veg shop - with things I'd never seen, as well as NZ kiwifruit and huge carrots and parsnips covered in dirt - just like we used to buy). The coastal villages had lots of little stone walls protecting them from the high tides and stormy conditions. Many of the villages began with Bally which apparently means in Gaelic 'Baile na', meaning 'place of' eg Ballymena, Ballymoney, Ballyrobert, Ballyclare, Ballyearl, Ballymacarrett (you get the picture).

It rains quite a bit in Ireland and so we changed some of our plans to suit the weather (no point in climbing a mountain when you can't see anything from the top etc). We went to the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum and it is one of the better ones we've seen - lots of machinery for Harry to look at, and lots of human interest stories to keep me interested. So, what did we see and learn:

• all about the life of the 'navvy' those poor unfortunate men who had the back breaking job of building the first railways ("railways were built with pick, shovel and wheelbarrow").
• the continued 'class' distinction between first, second and third class passengers on both the railways as well as other transportation such as ships like the Titanic.
• lots of signs in different colours, shapes and sizes but all saying the same thing "Please do not spit in the carriages. It is offensive to other passengers and is stated by the medical profession to be a source of serious disease".
• the life of the signalman - a pretty complicated job "signals that were manually operated by a signal attendant displayed a bewildering assortment of flags, discs, spheres, kites and semaphore arms"- a language all of its own.
  
• the code for the driver - a special whistle code; Going to or from Ennis - 2 prolonged whistles; to or from Turntable Road - 5 long and 2 short whistles; notice to guard to apply hand brake - 3 short whistles and one short whistle to take the brake off; etc etc.
• some sad stories of train accidents like the overloaded passenger train in Armagh, that couldn't go up the hill, so they took off the back carriages and unfortunately they ran back down the hill into a train behind. The passengers were locked in the carriages, and parents threw their children out the windows, but even so 88 people were killed and 400 injured. After that they introduced automatic brakes.
• woman upset the populace by taking to bicycles - wearing bloomers and 'mens attire' - "cycling gave woman a freedom that most respectable people, including other woman thought unacceptable and even immoral". A wonderful quote from Mrs Kennard when she came off her bike "I did present a most unladylike and unconventional appearance. My dress was torn to ribbons...and I was covered from head to foot in dust".
  
• the first exercycle was created in 1880's though probably never as popular as they are today in the gym or at home watching tv.
• the history of the black leather jacket so commonly worn by motor cyclists these days as it offers "practical, physical protection quite apart from the image it might create". I sat next to a 'bikie' on the way back from Ireland - he was tattooed up his arms and said he often gets searched by Customs - his 'patches' were in his bag but he was glad he had flown to the convention as he had spent '4 days in a sodden field' and longed for a shower (thankfully he didn't smell from 4 days without a wash and as we've said before bikies over here are quite different).
• and the Cortina - did every family have one? We did - and with the time came all the household trimmings, orange cushions, brown couches, big patterns, lots of nick nack things "our past is enshrined in memory and this essemblage of every day objects invites reflection on yesterdays style, the aspirational Cortina and the transience of life". Oh yes, it all looked familiar - and the words from the Tom Robinson band just suited. It has quite a catchy tune we found out when looking at the web and Harry is now whistling it much to his annoyance - he never wanted a grey cortina!!
  

Wish I had a grey Cortina Whiplash aerial, racing trim Cortina owner, no-one meaner Wish that I could be like him.

Twin exhaust and rusty bumper

Chewing gum at traffic light
Stop at red but leave on amber
Grey Cortina outa sight.

Furlined seats and lettered windscreen
Elbow on the windowsill
Eight track blazing Brucie Springsteen
Bomber jacket, dressed to kill.

Never cop a parking ticket

Never seem to show its age
Speed police too slow to nick it
Grey Cortina got it made

and before I get off the topic of cars - here's a quote from someone in Citroen to the chief designer (we have a little yellow one so it seemed quite appropriate).

"The car should be four wheels under the umbrella. It should be able to carry 2 French peasants, with 50 kilos of potatoes or a small barrel of wine.If the peasant were to put a box of eggs in the car, he should be able to drive over a ploughed field, without the eggs breaking. The car should be so easy to drive that even a peasant's wife can drive it".

We also managed to have a wander around Belfast - we wouldn't call it the most 'vibrant and super-charged city' on this Saturday night (but obviously others writing on the web have experienced a different city to us) but it felt safe to wander round as darkness began to fall, and we enjoyed seeing the sites and eating some good food (if anyone is visiting Belfast try Coco's - a bit more than a pub meal but oh so nice and the atmosphere is great - we sat in big lounge chairs eating our meal on our knees as all the tables were taken). In Belfast we wandered past:

• City hall - there is the Belfast Wheel there - a bit like the London eye - but goes round a bit faster and a few more times. So, we got a feel for the city, and the direction where we could wander to see a few sites. The city hall is being renovated and should be quite a picture inside when complete.
  
• The city is a mixture of new, old and derelict. The new, was mainly along the river, where the city is trying to look like a modern 21st century city, the old tucked away along side streets and the derelict seemed to be everywhere - buildings once used by a busy industrial town now no longer required but turned into a place for graffiti artists, window breaker and amateur demolition to practice their skills. Anyway, one of the buildings we couldn't quite find as we didn't have a picture of it was the building where the former Ulster Overcoat Company lived. This company is very well known as it designed and created the coat known as the Ulster - worn by, wait for it - Sherlock Holmes.
• St Anne's Cathedral (built with at least one stone from every county in Ireland) and just opposite - writers square (a great place for skateboarders). There were a number of famous people born in this city (CS Lewis - of Narnia Fame, George Best - footballer who played for Manchester United for a lot of his career and was renowned for a 'good life' - perhaps the Scots banning Happy Hours and 2 4 1 drinks might have helped him - who knows?).
• Along the quayside - where the Titanic was launched, and many thousands of people left for a new life in America and the Southern Hemisphere. The giant cranes 'Samson and Goliath' still stand over what was the biggest building dockyard in the world ie Harland and Wolff the designers and builders of the Titanic.
• We wandered over the Laban River on one bridge and back across the Queens Bridge which was opened in 1849 by Queen Victoria.

Besides food (you can get lamingtons, pavlovas and lots of NZ wines in the restaurants), the other thing they do well in Ireland is the leaflets - not just little ones that when they got wet sort of shrivel up into a mass of wet tissue - but big glossy ones that can withstand the inclement weather (eg for cycling maps), and lovely booklets to keep forever on the bookshelf with the few other books we will keep from our trip. As we were exploring we found Scrabo Hill. It has a monument built in the memory of Charles William Stewart - the third Marquis of Londonderry. The hill, was well known for its quarries and they have found a dinosaur footprint that they reckon was made by a dinosaur more than 200 million years ago - and very similar to one found in Switzerland as well. For 109 years the same family were caretakers of this monument (William McKay family) living in the top floors with 8 children and then looked after by grand daughters Elizabeth, Agnes and Jean Millin who opened it to the public and served tea and cakes right up to the 1960's when they "handed the keys back". I could not imagine living in this cold, stone tower for all your life, exposed to the wind and rain and yet there would have been a mystery about it that bought the family together. I have come to be quite fascinated by the engraved names and dates of those who have climbed towers and scarpered around rocks before me. I often wish I had the audacity to leave a 'mark' for someone like me to explore 100's of years later. Anyway, AH Jardine left his mark - he was born on 1 May 1900 but a quick look on the web doesn't really enlighten me as to who he was or if he was famous - he may not have been a local, but there were boxers, linen merchants, seaman all of a similar name so I will probably never know. Oscar Wilde once said: "Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not, and a sense of humor was provided to console him for what he is." (perhaps he was talking about me).
We got some great views of the golf course below from the tower and watched many a golfer skewing his ball in to the tall gorse bushes along the side and then scrambling through the gorse in the hope of finding it or to the next tee. It reminded me so much of home - my attempts to play at Karori or Judgeford where making a reasonable score was more from good luck than good play (and I never had much luck). On one of the day trips, when it was pouring with rain, but in the hope that it just might stop for a few minutes we drove to Bangor - voted by the Irish as the best place to live in the country. It was a bustling vibrant town only a few miles from Belfast but with a country feeling next to the coast. We could see the attraction through the raindrops. We drove on to Crawfordsburn Country Park - right next to the beach and to the Grey Point Fort and the obelisk marking the measured Mile used by Harland and Wolff to monitor the speed of vessels such as the Titanic. We weren't even tempted to explore as the weather man heard our plea for some 'dry time' and poured more down!! Huh!! There's lots more to see and do here and we'll be back!

An Irish Blessing
May Love and Laughter Light your Days
and Warm your Heart and Home
May Good and Faithful Friends be yours
wherever you may roam
May Peace and Plenty bless your world
with Joy that Long endures
May all lifes passing seasons
bring the best to you and yours.