The Wild Atlantic Way

Exploring the Irish North and West Coast / Day 15-17

By Keli & Sandra

October 6^th, 2016

North Coast

Warning: long post coming up! So we left off last along the Northern Coast of Ireland at Giant’s Causeway. We were continuing our journey counterclockwise working our way west.

First stop was the Carrick-a-Rede Bridge. Eager to keep moving along on our drive we walked for a short time and only took a picture from above. It can barely be seen in the photo but it is there!

Next up is the charming Ballintoy Harbour. It might look familiar to many as it is the filming location of the Game of Thrones’ Iron Islands and Pyke Harbour!

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Sheeps and The red door

Along the route to get to Ballintoy Harbour is The Red Door Cafe which is easy to find with its distinguishable sign upon its roof and can be seen from the highway.

They served amazing homemade desserts here and the cafe is run by a friendly gentleman and 3 ladies who you can credit for all of the baked goods. The outdoor seating offers a great view of grazing sheep in the neighboring farms. We liked these little ones punked out in hot pink.

We gave all of the baked goods an A+ in presentation!

After our coffee and dessert stop we walked over to a beautiful church at the top of the hill overlooking Ballintoy. The church was surrounded by a cemetery with some graves dating back to the 1800’s.

Let it be shared, this is not the first time Keli has taken me on a romantic walk through a cemetery ;)

the Meadows B&B

Next on our roadtrip we stopped by the town of Portrush for a pint in the Harbour Bar. We eventually found ourselves in Quigley’s Point staying at The Meadows Bed & Breakfast at the recommendation of our friend, Dusan.

We absolutely loved our stay here and probably will be the gold standard on the ideal bed & breakfast experience for some time.

Catherine, the owner, was so welcoming and we enjoyed talking with her on just about everything! She treats you like family and the home is immaculate, cozy and charming. Thank you for an amazing experience! And our first full Irish breakfast!

the most northerly point

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The next morning we headed out to Malin Head, the most northerly point in Ireland.

Sheep. Sheep. And more sheep.

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Galway

We decided to skip the rest of the northwestern coast and head straight down to Galway. This small city has the whole shabang of what a quintessential cute pedestrian Irish town center should be. We had an incredible dinner at Quay Street Kitchen. Insert immediate order of Keli’s obligatory lamb shank and my mussels!

CONNOLLY’S PUB

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We stayed overnight in the town of Kinvara at Kinvara Guesthouse.
It was a block from Connolly’s Pub where we ended our night.

This was such a gem of an experience and one of our highlights of our Ireland trip. Live Irish music, lively atmosphere, Guinness, whiskey and our $1 contribution which will (hopefully) be there forever.

The burren

Irish: Boireann, meaning “great rock” is a karst landscape in County Clare.

In history it has been described as a “country where there is not enough water to drown a man, wood enough to hang one, nor earth enough to bury him…”

In current times though we found the area abundant with life.

The west coast is the best coast

From California to Ireland! These coastlines reign supreme in both countries in our minds. We found similar but distinctly different characteristics of dramatic beaches, cliffs, and flora.

The next morning marked another exciting check off our bucket list… the Cliffs of Moher! It was as impressive (and intimidating) as all of the pictures we’ve ever seen. The walk is pretty scary to be looking straight down 390ft/120m from the top of the cliffs to the ocean.

Added to that were hard gusts of wind which had us crawling to grab side stones at one point and we came close to losing our hats.

Wierdly you can feel the sea spray at the very top of the cliffs from the waves crashing into the walls down below.

Killarney National Park

We ended the day camping along the lakes in Killarney National Park, Ireland’s oldest national park.
The next morning we went on a 11+ mile run around Middle and Lower Lake on trails surrounded by blackberry bushes, ferns, mossy trees, and thistles. We’ve run on some varied terrain before but now we can add cattle, horses, abandoned cottages and a cemetery to our list!