This is the second part of David's account of a driving holiday that took him to all the component countries of the British Isles. Read part 1 here.
Taking our car by ferry was a new experience for us. Given that they drive on the wrong side of
the road, we have never driven on the Continent. We disembarked in Larne, an
unlovely town where sectarian graffiti was in evidence. We hit the road up the Antrim coast. A good thing about this road is that one very
quickly loses sight of Larne! More
positively, we were at the start of one of the most beautiful coastal drives,
not just in the British Isles but in Europe.
We were staying at the somewhat idiosyncratic Ballygally Castle
hotel. Most guests stay in the large
modern wing but there is an old castle complete with haunted room, now just an
attraction and not used to accommodate anyone.
There was time for us to do a drive up one of the Antrim
Glens, finishing in Ballymena. It was
fairly easy at this time, when the Golden Jubilee was being celebrated, to tell
which towns are nationalist and which are unionist, by whether or not they’d
put up bunting. In Ballymena, which is
in Ian Paisley’s constituency, there was a lot of bunting! Smaller Northern Irish towns like this, on
either side of the religious divide, are often quite pleasant, rather
old-fashioned places. In Ballymena we
wanted to buy a map of the island of Ireland, having realized our map of the
entire British Islands, was not adequate.
I wondered whether, in this citadel of unionism, one would dare ask! But in the town’s old-fashioned bookstore we
acquired one with no trouble. Something
that was also becoming evident was that people in Northern Ireland, again
regardless of religious divide and despite the many years of the Troubles, tend
to be very friendly. On a scale of
friendliness across Europe I might put Northern Ireland at the opposite end to
Croatia, a country we have just visited, where poker faces seem to be the order
of the day.
Back at our hotel we were served a gargantuan dinner. For Cathy it was far too much and it was
almost so for me, albeit my appetite would hardly be described as
delicate. Next evening Cathy tried to
obviate a repeat of this experience by ordering an “8 oz” steak but their idea
of “8 oz” and ours are not the same so she still had too much for her
liking. The next day we drove over to
County Fermanagh, in the western part of the Province, almost as long a drive
as one can do within its borders. We
noticed en route signs to “Londonderry” with the “London” crossed
out: Nationalists of course know it simply as “Derry”. To avoid offending anyone, radio and TV staff
have taken to calling it “Derry stroke Londonderry”, earning it the sobriquet
“Stroke City”. Back home, I tried out on
a Northern Irish friend my theory that one can tell the religion of someone
from Northern Ireland by what they call the province’s second city. “That’s nonsense”, he snapped, “I’m a
Protestant and I call it Derry”. We
weren’t going there so didn’t have to call it anything.
Our drive took us through Omagh and on to Enniskillen, where
we had lunch. Both these town maybe
tried a bit harder than most to stay out of the Troubles, yet both were
afflicted by appalling IRA bombings. No
doubt the scars are there still but for the visitor they are handsome towns and
the person driving through Omagh might remember it for its complicated road
system. We then had a drive along Lough
Erne, a quiet corner of the Province that attracted visitors, particularly
anglers, even during the height of the Troubles. We came back via a different route
which took us through the Sperrin Mountains.
The next day we moved on to Belfast but first drove north,
along the coastal road, to visit County Antrim’s top two attractions. The first was the Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge,
which does feel rather precarious as one walks across. This is not there just for the tourist; its
purpose is functional and it has been there for hundreds of years. The other was, as might be guessed, the
Giant’s Causeway, a remarkable coastal formation. Legend has it that the same giant who created
the Causeway, simultaneously created Lough Neagh, the large lake in the middle
of Northern Ireland, and the Isle of Man, by taking a huge chunk of the mainland
and hurling it into the Irish sea. Maybe
there’s some truth in this - they are roughly the same size!
We had a charming guide who pointed out the northernmost
part of Ireland, which can be seen from here.
Contrary to what one might assume, it is not in Northern Ireland, being
in County Donegal and thus in the Republic.
The Good Friday agreement, which effectively ended the Troubles and at
this time had been in place for some four years, had, she told us, given a big
boost to the tourist industry in Northern Ireland. For all too many years the very idea of a
tourist industry in Northern Ireland had seemed rather ridiculous yet there is
great tourist potential, not least along the Antrim Coast. With the DUP and Sinn Fein having just agreed
to form a power-sharing government – something that would have been
inconceivable at the time of our visit – the prospects for a long-lasting peace
have never looked better.
We now headed for Belfast.
I still had a somewhat negative view of this city, the result of the
years of sectarian violence. I’d
wondered about heading straight for the South but Cathy felt that we should
have a look. We stayed at the Europa,
which in the seventies had the doubtful distinction of being the most bombed
hotel in Europe. Even at the time of our
visit there was unrest to the south of the city, in the Donegall Pass
area. But from our window high up a
peaceful city was spread before us. We
wondered into nearby Donegal Square, in the heart of the city centre. There was a vaguely menacing feel – but no
more than in any other British city when the shops shut and the chavs take over
the pedestrianized centres. The best
part of the city, which we didn’t get to, is supposed to be around the
University, an area that has been likened to the trendier parts of Dublin.
We had just one night in Belfast and next day headed south
to Dublin. We decided to take a scenic
route and thus meander along the coast.
We thought that en route we would take a look at Stormont, the
seat of Governemnt. We got directions
from our hotel and reckoned we were in the right area when we passed shops that
took their name from it. However, we
then found ourselves in a rather rundown area whereas Stormont, I knew, is in a
leafy district on the outskirts of the city.
Graffiti artists informed us that “Ulster will never be part of Eire”
(though actually part of it is, since only six of its nine counties were hived
off into Northern Ireland at time of partition). It occurred to us we had taken a wrong
turning. We stopped the car and spoke to
a soldier, who turned out to be from our home county of Surrey. He advised us to turn round there and
then. We were in “loyalist” East Belfast
but heading straight for the troubled Catholic enclave of Short Strand, scene
of recent riots which had been triggered by, of all things, someone putting up
bunting to celebrate the golden jubilee.
Now back on the right road, we found Stormont and were
allowed by the guards to drive up its impressive drive and have a look from the
outside – there was no question of being able to go in. Rather provocatively, it might be thought, a
statue of Sir Edward Carson still stands outside. He was the politician who masterminded the
separation of the Six Counties from the rest of Ireland and this makes him
something of a hero for Unionists, and rather the opposite for
Nationalists. Maybe the miserable
weather had something to do with it, but the part of Northern Ireland we now
drove through, on the way to the border, didn’t appeal to us in the same way as
areas previously visited. We had a brief
stop in the resort of Newcastle, which looked rather grim.
We crossed the border to the south of Newry. This is one of the most contentious borders
in Europe and is of course the UK’s only land frontier. Yet we only realized that we’d crossed it
when we noticed that our ‘A’ road had become an ‘N’ road! This rather unpretty area is not really the
best of introductions to the Republic Ireland.
First town was Dundalk, also unpretty and noted during the Troubles as a
hotbed of IRA activity. Drogheda, the
next town going south, seemed rather more pleasant.
Finding our hotel in Dublin was challenging. We’d decided to treat ourselves and stay in
the historic Shelburne, a five-star establishment. It’s located in St Stephen’s Green, in the
fashionable south of the city, and road signs were confusing – I’ve read
somewhere they are deliberately so, to discourage motorists. We managed to find the hotel but there was
nowhere to stop so we got swept up in the traffic, to get lost once more before
finally finding it again and being able to stop long enough for one of their
staff to take possession and put it in a nearby car park.
The Shelburne was a disappointment. It struck us as one of those places that
coast along on their reputation but are no longer that great. We rather felt that it was our privilege to
be their guest rather than vice versa.
The legendary Irish friendliness was hard to find, since nearly all the
staff were unsmiling. I was annoyed
above all to find that, this being a Monday, the fine Dining Restaurant was
closed; it closed on Tuesdays as well.
We’d arranged for some friends who live in Dublin to join us for a
meal. The hotel’s website had said
nothing about this and they had not otherwise forewarned us. By contrast the Europa in Belfast had written
to us advising that their fine dining restaurant is closed on Sundays. We only found out when we went to book with
reception. The young lady took the
booking but we asked her to contact the restaurant so we could reserve a
table. She then revealed, as if this was
a mildly interesting discovery on her part, that the restaurant was closed.
We saw a manager and were told that the closure was because
of – yes! – 9/11. There were no longer
enough American tourists, apparently. A
more enterprising management might have taken the view that shutting down
facilities was not the best way of attracting customers! We got them to book a nearby restaurant
though this turned out to be disappointing: it cost an arm and a leg but the
service was slow and the meal indifferent.
The next day we pressed on to our final stop, Kinsale on the
southwest coast. There was not much time
to explore Dublin. We walked up Grafton
Street, visited Trinity College and saw the Book of Kells, and made our way
north of the Liffey to O’Connell Street and the GPO, epicentre of the 1916
uprising. Getting out of the city was
somewhat easier than getting in, as we just had to go up to the river and then
drive along the parallel road. Before
long we were in open country. We took an
indirect route, heading first to Kilkenny for our lunchtime stop. This town,
perhaps the most attractive in Ireland, is a gem and we enjoyed our stroll
through it, finishing at a delicatessen where we got a good takeaway lunch. We carried on through Clonmel to Fermoy where
a pedestrian walked straight out in front of us – the village nearly lost its
idiot. We by-passed the City of Cork via
the Jack Lynch Tunnel, named from a former taisoeach and son of the
city.
Kinsale is a town of great charm set amidst magnificent
coastal scenery. We were staying at
Actons Hotel, only three-star but much better than the Shelburne. The staff were friendly and a room change so
we could get a seaview was arranged with no trouble. Rather like Ludlow, Kinsale has acquired
something of a gourmet reputation, and there was a good choice of
restaurants. But we were only there for
two nights and stuck to the hotel, a choice not regretted as the meals were excellent. The starter, which I had both times, was one
of my best ever, a simple dish of wild mushrooms cooked in a spiced
butter.
The next day was spent exploring the vicinity and then the
day came for the rather long drive home.
Not a fun day, especially as there was heavy rain as we headed for
Rosslare and the ferry; Waterford, where we stopped for a somewhat indifferent
lunch, seemed all too aptly named.
Wales, I fear, was getting short shrift compared to the other four
countries visited: we were simply passing through. So we drove non-stop through the lovely
county of Pembrokeshire, which we have however stayed in on earlier
occasions. Our only stop in fact was at
a motorway service station for the second indifferent meal of the day. But overall we had had a thoroughly enjoyable
trip.
First published in VISA 75 (October 2007)
