The Top of Ireland

From the south of Ireland to the north of Ireland... 6 hours. This weekend Maggie and I took one last trip and packed our bags for Belfast. Not just Belfast, in particular the Giant's Causeway. We left early sunday morning and arrived in Belfast mid afternoon. Since we had some time we hopping a taxi and checked out the Titanic Museum. There's a new museum built in the location of the shipyard where the Titanic was built.

The museum seemed to be shaped like an iceberg...

It was cool inside, there was a ton on the actual building of the ship and the process that went into creating such a state of the art cruise liner. But the thing that stood out the most to me were the messages from the morse codes that the Titanic sent out in distress. It all seemed a bit too real at that point reading the pleading messages for help from near by ships. It really makes your heart go out to these people that lost their lives that day.

We walked around for a bit then rounded the day off with... a burrito. Yes. It was probably the best part to the day. I like to think of the place we went to as Chipotle in disguise, it was almost the exact same thing.

The following day we took a Paddywagon tour up to the Carrick- a- Rede Rope bridge and Giant's Causeway. The day started off rainy and disgusting, typical Irish weather. But the further we got from Belfast the better the weather turned out to be and I had high hopes for the sun staying out while we crossed the bridge.

At the rope bridge we had to walk down a pathway to get to it which had spectacular views. You could see the Irish Island of Rathlin, the Scottish Isle Islay, and even Scotland 20 miles away. On our ten minute walk to the bridge it started to downpour on us, catching us off guard. That's Ireland for us i guess.

Just as we got closer to the rope bridge the sun came out and the rain moved out to sea. At that point, this place became truly spectacular. The water glistened and sparkled, the grass shone with the wet droplets and the sea glowed a magical blue- green. Its places like this that make me never want to leave Ireland.

You want me to cross THAT?

Made it!

 

On the Island of Carrickarede

The bridge was surprisingly sturdier than I had anticipated it to be and much shorter. The island of Carrickarede really has nothing but grass on it. I'm not really sure why its so popular, maybe its just for the view point. Either way, I think I found another favourite place.

Then it was off to the Giant's Causeway! The causeway was only about 15 minutes west of here conveniently. We had to take another little walk to get down to the honeycomb causeway. The rocks were so cool shaped so geometrically and fitting perfectly together. It's a wonder how nature can create something so... perfect. The sun stayed out the entire time we were there. I ended up bouncing around the funky shaped rocks like a kid in a play ground. It was calming to sit out on the causeway and watch the waves roll in. The rocks created such a sharp contrast to the water; the black uniform six sided rocks   against the blue free flowing water.

After the tour we got dropped off in front of City Hall. Since it was a holiday that monday, there was a market set up on the lawn of the city hall full of food vendors, jewelry stalls, and beer tents. We wandered around a bit until we got caught in an absolute downpour and had to run under the beer tent for cover.

To end our trip, Tuesday morning was spent wandering around Queens University. It's a beautiful campus... they even have a botanical garden! Belfast took me a bit by surprise this time. I really enjoyed it, better than Dublin even. I'm even more happy that I was able to get up to the Causeway before I leave.