Still plenty more photos to come, seven months after the fact. One of my favorite parts of the trip was spending time in Northern Ireland, especially Bushmills. We stayed at the Bushmills Inn while touring the area. The smell of burning peat in the fireplace is now forever linked to this town in my mind. The hotel burned it in the fireplaces and the whole town smelled like it from the nearby distillery.
Giant’s Causeway is a nearby basalt formation on the North coast. It is notable because if its 40,000+ interlocking basalt columns that were the result of an ancient volcanic eruption. We didn’t run into big crowds anywhere on the trip, but there were a decent number of them here. I can’t even imagine how crowded this is in the summer.
this was a little further down the road at a fishing village:
The Giant’s Causeway is on my bucket list. I remember that it was chilly when you went to Ireland, but I don’t remember when you were there; what month was it? Yours was an extra special trip as it included seeing many family members in addition to seeing the sights. I imagine having your history intertwined in the local history increases the pleasure of your experience exponentially. My family emigrated so long ago we no longer have any relatives in Ireland that anyone remembers.