Edinburgh to Ireland

Day 3, our friends took us to North Berwick. On the way, we stopped for breakfast at a place called The Drift. I, for one, really am into recycling and was excited to see The Drift owners had utilized several metal shipping containers to construct their restaurant on a plot of land on a cliff with an amazing view of the windswept beach below. The Drift has a small but adequate menu and specialty coffees. I had the Poached Egg on Toast (basically an eggs Benedict) and Diane had the Brioche French Toast.

Just up the road, typical of several castles we saw, was Tantallon Castle. An amazing ruin with a breathtaking view of the Firth of Forth/North Sea and coastline. Built about 1358 on a cliff top, it was home to the Douglas family. It was subjected to sieges in 1491, 1528 and ultimately by Oliver Cromwell in 1651. Cromwell used lots of canon fire to demolish most of the castle we see today.

Some walls were 13 feet thick and 7 story gun towers reduced to 4 stories and held off most of Cromwell’s army until they started to fall and allow his guys to take the castle. You can still walk all the way up on some pretty small circular stairs and get a sense of life in the castle. Once on top of the parapets, you get sweeping views of the coast and beach below the castle.

We then rode our way into North Berwick, a wonderful little coastal town with a harbor straight out of Doc Martin or Father Brown. Unfortunately, North Berwick is also known for its famous Witch Trials from 1590-92. Back then, if you needed to get rid of uppity women, you labeled them a witch and the townspeople would remedy the situation by hanging or burning them at the stake. Not cool.

North Berwick’s natural harbor, even today, serves as a landing for ferries between it and Anstruther in Fife across the Firth of Forth (I love saying that). The Industrial Revolution bypassed Berwick and it became a golf and vacation spot for north Scotland.

Our last day in Scotland we, of course, had to do a Formal Tea at Prestonfield House (yes, Debbie). The wonderful estate house, now a hotel, originated as a monastery back in 1150 but was burned down in an anti-Catholic riot in 1681. James Dick (not kidding) bought what was left and turned it into an estate around 1687.

We were met by an extensive menu of Tea selections and two courses of sandwiches and desserts. We could order pots of any or all of the Teas they listed as often as we wanted. We were pretty full at the end and tried to walk it off around the park in front of the hotel. There we found some of the Scottish Highland Cattle indigenous to the area. Big hairy cows, some with “Longhorn” style horns.

That day, we made our way back to Edinburg International Airport for our incredibly short flight to Belfast, Northern Ireland. It was a parabolic flight, once in the air at altitude, the Captain told us to put our seatbelts back on and prepare for landing, we began our descent, back to the ramp, maybe 30 minutes takeoff to landing, tops.

The following day, we began with breakfast at The Pocket. Literally a tiny café in an alley (known as a “Close” in these parts). A quaint little place with few tables and chairs but a great menu.

Then we made our way to the St. George's Market. A three day Victorian style market over the weekend, the market basks under an extensive roof built by the City between 1890 and 1896. It is an award winning European Market with over 300 stalls of food, swag, music and food park. It’s dog friendly and even runs “a quiet hour” each day for sound sensitive customers.

During the Blitz in WWII, it was used as an emergency Mortuary. In the 1980’s, the facility was needing extensive upgrades and the City of Belfast considered selling the land to developers but the citizens began a campaign to fund a restoration to keep the market alive and they reopened the doors in 1999.

After the Market, we made our way to the Titanic Museum. Titanic, along with its sister ship the Olympic, were built at Harland and Wolff in Belfast Harbor. The museum was built on the site of the dry docks used in their building.

The museum is designed like the bow of Titanic which provides a gage of how big the ship was. Literally thousands of men worked on Titanic. The keel was laid in 1909 and completed the physical structure in 1911. Inside was a great interactive ride which took us  through the sometimes dangerous iron work in Titanic’s construction at the shipyard.

Titanic Test Model

Inside are many relics from the ship and the many stories of the passengers and crew who perished. Touching stories of heroics and tragedy once the ship was struck and sank. Many of the mistakes made during that time were subsequently remedied by changes in International Law like providing enough lifeboats for all passengers, lifeboat drills, 24 hour staffed radio operators and iceberg patrols to warn ships of dangerous ice flows. Titanic trivia, it was the first use of the call for help, S.O.S.

Dinner was at The Morningstar Bar and Restaurant where we met a delightful young woman server who turned out to be a college student from New Mexico of all places. Great old pub established in 1810 with an extensive menu. I had a terrific Morning Star Gourmet Burger and fries, Diane had the Roast Beef.

Gracehill

Next day, we drove to Bushmills, Ireland. On the way, we stopped at Gracehill, Ireland a UNESCO World Heritage site. It began as a Moravian church town in 1763. They were a breakaway sect of Catholics turned Protestant from Bohemia around 1457 and settled in Germany. Like Quakers, to avoid further persecution, they came to Gracehill to create a religious settlement which still exists today.

While waiting for the Millside Restaurant to open for lunch, we came across a lovely 93 year old woman, Roberta Thompson, who realized we were tourists and gave us a quick tour of her home town. Moravians were at one time segregated in all their activities keeping men and women, boys and girls separate until marriage. Even the cemetery has women on one side and men on the other. They are now integrated and have a sizeable presence in Africa, parts of Europe and the US.

Then we made our way to Bushmill and the Giants Causeway on the north coast with a portion of Scotland in view a mere 60 miles away. Really wild coastline with wind whipped crashing waves in what had to be freezing ocean water. The rock outcroppings were thousands of basalt columns rising out of the ground. The columns are hexagonal and look as though they were cut by machine. They are the result of an ancient volcanic eruption back in the Paleogene era about 45 million years ago.

After walking back up from the beach, we stopped in the Causeway Hotel and rested. While there, we had a nice cheese Charcuterie and, being in Bushmill, I sampled a glass of their famed Whiskey (no Jameson here).

There is some disagreement as to where Whiskey (Whiskey with an E is distilled in Ireland, Whiskey without an E is distilled in Scotland) came from, Ireland or Scotland. Most likely when Monks experimented with Mediterranean distillation in the 1400’s. They referred to their amber liquid as “aqua vitae”, water of life, back around 1405. It is first mentioned, of course, in Scottish tax records in 1494. Then, in the 1780’s, they made laws forcing distillers to be licensed and began the backyard distillery business, dodging Revenuers, that continues to this day. Really fun.

Next day we journeyed to Dublin, Republic of Ireland, by train. We hopped onto an Ireland Rail train line south to Dublin about two hours on a very comfortable ride with only three stops. That part of Ireland is very scenic like, I imagine, most or all of Ireland is. Very green with rolling hills and a brief view of the Irish Sea. We had brought good weather to Belfast but Dublin was occasional rain showers with a biting cold wind at times. On the way to our hotel, our Uber driver told us, in Ireland, you can get all four seasons in one day. There is evidence that is true.

After dropping off our bags, we motored over to The Brazen Head for lunch. The Brazen Head is Dublin's oldest Pub in what was the center of Dublin’s Old Town. The Pub is originally the site of a hotel built in 1198 and subsequently a stable/hotel in the 1700’s. The Pub sits at the foot of the Father Mathew Bridge which crosses the River Liffey which was the original entry point to the Dublin settlement back to Viking times. The Irish name for Dublin is Baile Atha Cliath means “The Town of the Hurdle Ford” which refers to the way people used to cross the river at low tide by stomping down the reeds growing along the river ultimately replaced by bridges.

Inside the Pub, the interior reeks of 17-18^th century vibe with ancient doors still separating the rooms. In the bar where we sat, were hundreds of US dollars, pound notes and Euros (only accepted by Dublin businesses, The Republic of Ireland is still in the EU) lining the walls along with shoulder patches from various agencies including a California Highway Patrol patch I was sitting under.

Then we attended our Guiness Storehouse Tour. In the former St. James Gate brewery, they remodeled and created the Guiness Experience. Started by Arthur Guiness in 1759, Guiness signed a lease on a disused brewery site for 9,000 years at 45 pounds a year (pretty good deal if you ask me).

Begun as an Ale, Guiness changed to a Stout in 1799. The dark beer, with a creamy thick head and tingly-acidic taste created by injecting nitrogen and carbon dioxide, became popular and at one time was marketed as medicinal and typically given to nursing mothers and hospital patients. Over 10 million pints are served in the world daily.

Guiness became international in 1827 and is now brewed in 49 countries. The Harp Trademark is modeled on the Trinity College harp, an Irish icon. When the Irish Government wanted to use the Harp in its logo, they had to pay Guiness to avoid a Copyright violation. Wow.

The Verdict: Belfast vs. Dublin

As our journey wound down, someone asked which city I preferred. While I haven’t explored every square inch of the Emerald Isle, Dublin took the crown for me.

Don't get me wrong—every person we met across the island was incredibly warm and helpful. However, Belfast felt a bit colder, edgier, and more overtly commercial. We passed quite a few closed businesses with heavy iron security gates, plenty of graffiti, and a visible homeless population. It just didn't quite give off an aura of total safety.

Dublin, by contrast, felt cosmopolitan yet distinctly warmer and less hectic. The King Street area where we stayed was vibrant, clean, and colorful, with very little graffiti and no obvious security locks on the storefronts.

All in all, it is an incredibly welcoming place to visit. At one point, a local shop worker even apologized to us, mistakenly thinking we were Canadians. I absolutely loved both Scotland and Ireland, and I wouldn’t mind heading back someday.