Dunluce Castle

A difficult picture to take with trembling hands as the girls lean over the edge of a 200 foot drop.

The castle itself is accessible by a narrow bridge with about a 150 foot drop below. Fun times.

We had a perfect day - 16 degrees Celsius with barely any wind and a great sun for pictures and running through the castle grounds.

The castle is classified as 'in ruin" and surely it is. But how impressive that on these sheer cliffs it has stood as it has for about 400 years. We noted several places where it appears that renovations are under way in an effort to do at least some refurbishing. In places this seems to miss the mark as a clash of modern building materials merge with these clearly ancient stones. Perhaps it is for safety and if so...tough to argue. But we left with the concern that it might, in places, lose some of the wonder that comes with running your fingers along stones that were once used as a fireplace, shelter, hall, toilet...(oh yes we did).

Susan with a timely prompt: "Declan is a bit higher than you in that backpack!"

Looking out the castle walls, the cliffs are impressive; the arch in the center left was magnificent but the camera battery died so this is an iphone shot in difficult lighting. 

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In the learning center, comment cards hang from the walls with mostly repetitive notes of gratitude and awe. Some, however, make you laugh out loud and appreciate that some folks take the effort to leave a personal touch. The card above describes what looks like a young girl's blunt reaction and depiction of the story of how a seismic event led to the kitchen area collapsing in to the sea hundreds of years ago. Not even our Ronan would have put it so factually!

Some other winners: 

"I seen some cool things here but in the jail cell someone wrote help. That's not cool"

"This is a cool place. I met a lot of American Girls and the Castle is cool too"

Nothing beats the naïveté you get from kids or the honesty you get from anonymous men

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Less than a decade ago, a major archeological dig uncovered some of the town of Dunluce itself, just outside of the castle walls.  In the late 1600s the town was burned to the ground by "Irish Uprising" of 1641 (or, as I like to think of it, controversially, the Irish trying to return Ireland to the Irish - not supposed to talk about those things in the North, but, well...).


Here are the kids mocking up an archeological dig.

A view of the Castle as we walk back up to the car, ready for our drive back to Annagassan the (very long and windy) way - along the coast and then through the Glens of Antrim

...but before we go, a video update on Declan's language development. 

He now says 'cheese', or rather 'cheeeeeeeesssssse' every time a phone or camera appears. It is like he's been hit with a stun gun! I think Ronan might face some competition for ham of the year as we march on...