Fiona's overseas adventures: 4 days in Northern Ireland

This was one of those random holidays that came about from cheap flight deals, me wanting to travel and a friend that really wanted to see Northern Ireland.

After some last minute organisation we made it. First day in Belfast walking around the centre; City Hall in sunshine, Cathedral Square in sunshine, Writers Square in sunshine (We hadn't had much sun in Edinburgh lately and I was loving the rays in Ireland)

City Hall

Cathedral Quarter Then we jumped on a bus tour to see greater Belfast which consisted of Parliament House, the ship yards where the Titanic was built, the ex-mean streets of Shankill and Falls roads that saw most of the Catholic v's Protestant clashes, wall murals, botanic gardens and the rest of the usual tourist suspects.

Aida and myself on the top deck of the tour bus.

The court house where a lot of the IRA trials were heard - very worse for wear.

Bush Jnr gets a whole wall mural dedicated to his war

Lots of wall murals. Here's a selection of topics.

If you look really hard there is the face on the mountain (forehead to the left; nose, mouth and chin to the right) that is supposed to have inspired Johnathan Swift's sleeping giant in Gulliver's Travels. Enough of Belfast. We hired a car and drove anticlockwise around the country (you could do it in one very long day; we took three days, sightseeing everything along the way).

I got to drive the GT! (Only went on the wrong side of the road once - damn having driven in Canada, it's got me all mixed up)

We drove the Causeway Coastal Route which made me feel like I was driving the Great Ocean Road back home. My favourite part of Nth Ireland was on this route in the north.

Other images of the country as we drove by. Old stone buildings. Lots of sheep.

One of the many tractors we got stuck behind.

Forest drives

Random castles in the middle of town

View points One of the many castles.

This photo was taken at Carrickfergus Castle, one of the few medieval castles in Ireland that King John visited with one of those 'modern' hole in the wall chambers (toilet). Where 'sitting on the John' comes from?

Dunlance Castle, on the headland of some amazing scenery and dating back to viking times.

My first beach in a long time - Ballygally Castle Beach. It was a fun name to say,

but there was now way I was getting into that freezing water. (check out those reflective white legs)

Our home for the night. Aida found this amazing little hostel at the base of the cliffs, in front of a rugged beach.

The sunset from the beach. And above the hostel cliffs were some ruins of buildings that a Bishop (must have been loaded) built for 'his cousin'. It would've been an impressive estate when people were living there.

The 'library/observatory' on the cliff.

With this view down the beach

Before we set off the next morning we went for a walk on the beach (and celebrated more sunshine).

And I was so excited about seeing my foot prints in the sand and feeling the sand in between my toes. This was my favourite place of the holiday, besides the hostel with it's beach.

Giant's Causeway and coast line. It is World Heritage listed and is pretty amazing. Lots of polygonal columns of volcanic rock that look like a behive and make some pretty big and interesting steps.

Aida and myself at the top of the cliffs looking down on the crazy formations (between us).

And the scenery from the other direction Next was the over-rated suspension bridge at Carrick-a-rede where the fishermen used to rig up a similar bridge to check their salmon nets on the other side of the island.

Luck the coast line scenery made it worth the visit it.

Sunday morning in Ireland trying to get breakfast somewhere / anywhere in the city. Apparently not till church is finished and the stores open after lunch.

Our main plan for the last day. The Northern Ireland history park. We couldn't find it the day before so we drove back to where we were told it was the following day. After a few frustrating hours of consulting tourist information and maps telling us about it we found it and discovered why it was so hard to find. It looked like it had been closed for over a year. They took the road signs down, but really need to stop printing it in tourist info!