Northern Ireland Excursions

As time winds down, Corna and I decided we wanted to try and soak up as much of Ireland as possible. After getting to Kerry, the next stop I was dying to hit was The Giant's Causeway and Carrick-A-Rede Rope Bridge. We decided that this was one last thing we couldn't leave Ireland without doing!

We booked our tour with Paddywagon tours. I've been on a number of tours with them and they're great! They claim to be the best in the world and I have to say, it's definitely the best tour company I have every used, so I can't really even refute that claim.

We got to the bus stop around 7:15 am coffee in hand and boarded the bus. The tour was to take us to Belfast, the rope bridge and the Giant's Causeway with a few stops in between to break up the journey. This is something I think they do really well; break up the trip with interesting pit stops.

We could not have asked for a better day! Everything, even just the view from the bus was perfect. It was warm, clear and incredibly sunny.

Our first (real) stop was at the Dark Hedges just beyond Belfast. This is a well known spot from HBO's Game of Thrones. Apparently the show is filmed in Northern Ireland, which is something I didn't know! I've tried to watch the show a couple of times, but now I am more inclined to stick with it since I've been there haha.

          

Next stop was the Carrick-A-Rede Rope Bridge. If you've been on pinterest or look up any pictures of Northern Ireland, one of the most prominent and well known sites is the Carrick-A-Rede rope bridge. It connects the tiny island of Carrickarede to the mainland. The views from even just the walk to the bridge are magical. The water is a gorgeous shade of teal and there is nothing but green grass and awesome views of surrounding islands. It's nothing like I've ever seen before in Ireland.



            

            

            

                             

                             

After the rope bridge, we traveled just a bit further and arrived at The Giant's Causeway. The Giant's Causeway is a basalt rock formation that is left over from an ancient volcanic eruption. That is the scientific reason. The real reason for all intents and purposes is that a giant in Northern Ireland built the path to investigate the giant in Scotland. It disintegrated on his way back to Northern Ireland when he saw that the Scottish giant was 3 times his size! Obviously that is the real cause of the Causeway ;).





 

              

 

Once again, the views were incredible. It's hard to be in such a beautiful place sometimes because all you want to do is take pictures to remember it by. In actuality, most of the time, the pictures do not do it justice and you have to take a moment to just take all of the mental pictures you can because those will be more amazing than any photograph you could take on a camera.

We grabbed some lunch at a pub called The Nook. Court got the seafood chowder and I got the Fish & Chips. Both were unreal. We talked about it for the next week haha.

Our last stop was in Belfast City Centre. We had an hour so Court and I checked out City Hall and grabbed a snack and some coffee at a Cafe Nerro (there's one on every corner) before heading back. The city is lovely and the buildings are awesome. A lot of them have the old English influence (as it's part of the UK), but there's also a bunch of modern buildings as well. It has a very different vibe from Dublin, but it was cool to spend a bit of time there.

 

We headed back to Dublin, which was the longest part of the journey. It was a long day, but one of my favorite adventures. I have wanted to see Northern Ireland since before I even decided to move to the Republic of Ireland. I'm so happy to have crossed another 2 things off my endlessly growing bucket list and it was even better to do it with Corna who shares the same lust for travel and adventure that I do.

Lots of love,
Paige xx