On Monday morning, I headed towards Dunfanaghy, only taking one wrong turn on my way and having to turn back around (but I got a really nice view of some mountains on my detour). At Dunfanaghy I took a little sideroad and drove around Sheephaven Bay. Here I took a walk on the cliffs where it was extremely windy. I could lean into the wind and not fall over. It was very therapeutic, I felt very invigorated afterwards.
From here I travelled through Letterkenny and up to Buncrana and around the Inishowen Peninsula, stopping at Malin Head which is the most Northerly point on mainland Ireland.
I then drove onto Derry, where I stayed the night in a lovely B&B called Sunbeam House (which I found very easily!). The owner was very friendly and gave me a map of the city and gave me a list of all the things I could see and do in Derry. That night, I walked around the walls of the city which are the oldest, best preserved walls in Ireland. There are some original cannons sitting on the walls and some stories about the history of the walls and the city.
The next morning, I visited the murals on the walls in the Bogside which have been painted by "The Bogside Artists" which depict scenes from the troubles in Ireland as well as messages of hope for peace. These were very moving pieces of work, and I found myself close to tears while looking at them and reading their dedications, particularly "The death of innocence" which is dedicated to the memory of a 14 year old schoolgirl who was killed in the crossfire between the British Army and The IRA, and another mural which depicts a priest and civil rights protesters carrying the body of one of the youngest killed in the Bloody Sunday Massacre.
While in The Bogside, I also visited the Bloody Sunday Memorial.After my visit to the Bogside, I went back to the walled city and went to The Tower Museum, where I learnt about the early history of Derry.
By this time it was early afternoon, and time for me to get going if I was going to make it to Belfast in the evening. I drove to Downhill where I visited an old, ruined house and Mussenden Temple, which is situated on the edge of a cliff by the sea.
My next stop was Dunluce Castle, which is a ruin just outside of Portrush. It is basically just a shell, and some of the Castle was lost to the sea when the cliff collapsed underneath it in 1639.
As I visited The Giant´s Causeway last year, I didn´t bother stopping here this year on my way to the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge. Instead, I crossed this rope bridge to Carrick Island. The bridge itself is about 18metres long, and about 25 metres above the waves below. The most nerve-racking part about crossing the bridge is not the fact that it moves under your feet, but that the rope handrails give way somewhat as you place your hands on them. Originally, the rope bridge was built so that fishermen could cross to Carrick Island to cast their nets in the water in the best spot to catch migrating Salmon. These days, it´s tourists who use the bridge.
I quickly stopped at the Ould Lammas Fair in Ballycastle, to buy some Dulse and Yellowman. Dulse is an edible seaweed which tastes like...seaweed. It was quite revolting, and after eating one piece I threw the rest away. Yellowman is a very yellow, hard honeycomb which actually tasted pretty good.I then drove through the Glens of Antrim to Belfast. I drove around the city, looking for a place to stay. I tried a few B&B´s but they had no vacancies. Luckily, I managed to get the last bed at a hostel, so I didn´t have to sleep in my car on the street!
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