Friday we drove to Donegal. We stayed in a B&B called Island View. There was an Island to view from it but it was not worth the naming of the B&B. But it was a very nice place. We toured Donegal Castle, walked around town and decided to go out to eat. We used the GPS to find a seafood restaurant that was close. We picked the closest one which was twenty miles away. We followed all the instructions and the highway turned into a road about 2 miles out of town. In about 10 miles the road turned into a narrow lane. Two more miles had us on a one lane cowpath(one lane for the cows only) with twists and turns. By that time we were committed because there was no turning around. We followed the instructions to the end and there was no restaurant at all. Soooo we did everything backwards(Ardith is the driver and was THRILLED), I will share the pics of the cowpath when I get to a good connection.
We did go to the second choice on the GPS and it was called The Lobster Pot. The owner met us at the door and seated us in a comfortable pub with great service and Guinness. I really thought even Ardith was tempted to try some liquid courage for the trip home but she opted for water. I am so smart that I made her the driver.
I word about breakfast at the B&B. The traditional Irish breakfast is an egg with hard yolk, sausage, bacon(more like Canadian bacon) and a broiled tomato. I love it and was really thrilled to eat this the first 2 days. On the third day I informed the owner that I would like a traditional Irish breakfast. She said that that included black pudding. I backed off on the traditional thing because black pudding is pigs blood. All I could think was that there was a pig somewhere that would had to make a strong commitment to my breakfast.
Today is Saturday. Day four and Ardith had won three rounds out of four with the car. We decided that we'd call the cowpath adventure the GPS win. We drove to Coloraine but stopped in LondonDerry to walk the city walls. We asked the tourist information guide if we were ok in flip flops for the wall walk because we figured it was the width of a good strong wall. Well, we were fine as the city wall was really wide. Wide enough to have a church on one part and a restaurant perched on another part. So we were fine.
We went on the Colraine and checked into Breezemount Cottage. This is no cottage. Remember we walked all the way around LondonDerry on the wall. We discovered we were on the 4th floor of this charming little cottage. Of course, I forgot a couple of things and have made this climb 4 times so far and we haven't even finished the day.
We decided to go to Giants Causeway. It's a formation of rocks that has quite a story behind them. The rocks are tall and skinny and look like cigarettes for a giant.
Actually, the story goes that there was a giant in Ireland that was in love with a girl that lived on an island in Scotland. He decided to build a bridge all the way to this Island so he could visit her anytime. A giant from Scotland ruined the connection on that end so the Irish giant let it go to ruins. The lore is that there is a bridge at the bottom of the sea all the way to Scotland that has sunk in the water.
The boring geologists say that it was formed by a volcano eruption underground and when the volcano lava shot out of the ground and hit the cold water the lava hardened fast to form the columns.
I'm going with the giant story.
Tomorrow we go to DownPatrick by way of Belfast. We will be on the same roads our ancestors traveled. My guess is they weren't traveling in a very small car looking up at the truck tires as they brush by your rear view mirror. We plan on visiting the Rooney original homestead and visiting the church that our ancestors were married and buried in. My great hope is that we meet at least one blood relative. My other hope is that they aren't in jail or a serial killer or in the cemetery. Stay tuned I'll post again in a bit(in Ireland in a bit could be 2 hours or 10 days)
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