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Published: August 8th 2008
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Last night was a quite one in the hostel as we had the place to ourselves until the Hungarians came home after 1am. We became used to the hostel and enjoyed the fact that you were not locked up in a room until you left the building. The freedom of being able to sit on a couch, make a cup of tea, listen to music and use the internet while roaming around the place in your socks is good. On the other side you have to share a bedroom with up to 10 others all with different sleeping habits. We had half the dorm to ourselves while the Hungarians had the other half which was separated by a curtain. The owner Liz (who is an international storyteller) showed us the private dorms last night which catered for families and small groups. I would recommend this place to anyone. She charges £10/€15 per person per night and is great value. Google Ballyeamon Barn to find it.
This morning after breakfast we booked out of the hostel and hit the road for the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge. Again it was wet out, but at this stage we are used to it. To get
to the bridge we had to re-trace the steps that I had to take to get petrol yesterday and so Michelle got a piece by piece story of what happened ,as she was asleep and I wouldn’t of wanted her to miss out! We passed through small picturesque towns of Knocknacranny and Cushendon. The weather did Cushendon
no justice and it would be a place I would like to go back too. In Ballycastle we continued with the Causeway Costal Route until we reached the car park for the rope bridge.
We queued up and paid our £3.70 each to see the bridge. The walk was 1km and even with the poor weather there was a lot of people heading that way. The views along the walk were spectacular and soon we were at the bridge. Michelle went first and I waited back to take a photo of her crossing it. Next it was my turn and the bridge is quite shaky. Across and on to the island, it provided great views of the cliffs and hundreds of seagulls who had made homes on the cliff face. The bridge was originally built by the fisherman returning from the island
after salmon fishing. Rain was still coming down so we soon headed back to the car.
A quick change of clothes we headed for the town of Bushmills and the Old Bushmills Distillery. Here we took a tour of the distillery where they showed us how the whiskey is made and where its bottled. It was very interesting to see how it was made. The whiskey is stored in big wooden vats that had been previously used for sherry, bourbon and port. This is where they say it gets its taste. Unfortunately no pictures are allowed to be taken in the distillery (because of the high amount of alcohol in the air and battery operated equipment), so I only have ones of me and Michelle in the bar sampling the vintage Bushmills! I’m sure Bushmills is a fine whiskey but lets just say its not for me or Michelle.
The final part of our journey today was to head to Portrush. We arrived about half an hour after leaving Bushmills and had a quick drive around to find our guesthouse. We found it shortly and after a few minutes we were out and about trying to find something
to eat. Being in a sea-side town/resort we felt fish and chips was to be the order. The Spinnaker restaurant that we went to didn’t fail and we a had fine feed of fish, mushy peas and chips. At this stage we were feeling tired after the early start so we headed back to the guesthouse for some much needed sleep.
We have been holding back on going to the Giants Causeway until we get a fine clear day and tomorrow is our last chance. The weather report is for a dry day so we’ll settle for that. We also hope to see Dunluce castle which is situated right on the cliff edge.
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siobhan
non-member comment
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how many times did ye walk the feckin bridge to get all those photos!!! and darren re. last photo.... the world asks what the frick were ya thinkin when you went out in public lookin like that!!!