The UK had been a whirlwind so far. Starting with the luggage delay in London, we stayed in five different places in 19 days. That’s a lot of moving. Way too much. That pace of travel is too much over a sustained length of time. We were worn out.
Pulling up to our next place in Belfast, we decided to just take it easy for the next couple of days. The Airbnb we were staying was the perfect place for a couple of days of relaxation. It was like staying at your grandmother’s place. It had all kinds of grandmotherly charm (e.g. commemorative plates of the royal family) as well as all the amenities we needed – a washer and dryer, good wifi, separate bedrooms for each of the kids, two living rooms (one for us away from the kids!!!), and a playstation!! All of this in the heart of the city for $50/night. Unbelievable.
We used the time there to recover. I felt a bit guilty that we didn’t do any sightseeing. Brett has never been to Belfast before but we had to take a break somewhere and we were too tired to enjoy getting out anyway. We relaxed around the house for a couple of days with the exception to heading out to my cousin Maureen’s place for dinner one evening. So nice seeing Maureen and her family again including her sweet little grandson. Such a nice evening catching up and enjoying the company of family.
My cousin Ronnie and his lovely wife Lucia joined us as well. While there are family resemblances I notice with many of my relatives, Ronnie has an uncanny resemblance to my father in both looks and more strikingly his mannerisms. It is oddly comforting to spend time with him.
We traveled from Belfast to our next place in Portrush on the north coast (we’re now on our 7th place in 22 days!). Portrush is a holiday destination for many – nice beaches and an amusement park. Similar to our Belfast house, we had a large house with lots of space for us all. We chose Portrush because it is near my cousin Jacqueline’s place in Limavady.
We took the scenic drive around the coast from Belfast to Portrush. It was beautiful. We arrived in Portrush around 7pm and decided to head back out to visit the Giant’s Causeway in the evening to avoid the busloads of tourists the following day. Smart move. It was perfect. No crowds and beautiful lighting from the sunset.
The following day we had a wonderful dinner at Jacqueline’s house. As always, it is so fun to catch up with her and her husband Graham. The kids love visiting them too. They were very grateful to Graham for the tour he took them on.
With the pace of our travels and the many museums, castles, and historical sites, the kids can get burnt out. We need to remind ourselves that this is their trip too and that they need to be able to do some things that are just purely kid’s fun. So we spent a day at the amusements in Port Rush. There were haunted houses, roller coasters, and bumper cars to keep them amused.
The last thing we decided to do was the Ferris wheel. There was a slight drizzle while we were lining up for the ride. By the time we got on and halfway up to the top, the skies opened up and the serious rainfall started. As we got to the top, the rainfall was blowing sideways and into the car we were in. We were soaked to the skin at the end. Each time the we made it to the bottom of the Ferris wheel we were cheering and hoping it was going to stop to let us out and each time it kept going back up, there was a collective moan. It was so bad we just had to laugh.
So that was it for Northern Ireland this time around. Short and sweet. It is such a beautiful part of the world and we didn’t even scratch the surface on this trip. We would definitely recommend taking the scenic coastal route around the north and an evening visit to Giant’s Causeway is the best time of day to go.