Carrick-a-Rede, Giant's Causeway and Bushmills

We started off early again and today we are following the “Coastal Road”. This route starts in Belfast and follows the coast all the way to Londonderry and is described as having views of outstanding beauty. Our first stop along the route is the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge. The bridge was originally built by fishermen to gain easier access to the island for fishing. Now this bridge is used by tourists. The surrounding area was amazing and you could see many birds flying and nesting along the coastal walls. Crossing the bridge was not as “daring” as it looks in photos. Our next stop along the coastal road is the more famous “Giant’s Causeway”. Formed by lava millions of years ago, the Giant’s Causeway looks like many perfectly shaped hexagon steps that run out into the sea. An island in Scotland also has the same formations. The story goes like this; Finn McCool and a giant in Scotland wanted to do battle so Finn McCool built the causeway to go battle Scotland’s giant. However, upon seeing the much larger Scottish giant he flees back to Ireland, the Scottish giant in turn uses the Causeway to go to Ireland and fight. However, Finn McCool’s wife dresses him up as a baby to trick the much larger giant. He buys the trick and flees in terror at the potential size of Finn McCool and destroyes the causeway as he goes so that Finn can’t follow. Our next stop was the Bushmill’s campsite. It was still fairly early in the day so we decided to walk into town to visit the distillery for a tour. We had just over an hour to wait for the next tour to start so we went into town and had something to eat. The distillery tour was short and very similar to the Famous Grouse, but for some reason this tour was much hotter than that one. We had the choice of 4 different Irish whiskey’s to try, so Julie tried the sweetest one, the Black Bush and I tried the Special reserve that is only sold at the distillery. I didn’t like it very much, but thankfully Julie enjoyed hers. We made our way to the campsite and used the free WiFi that was strangely located in the laundry/dishwashing room. The showers at this campsite were the best we have had in Europe – we might even go as far as to say they were the best we’ve ever had anywhere.