Highlights of Northern Ireland in a Day

Although Ireland is in its name, Northern Ireland is technically a part of the United Kingdom and not Ireland. Northern Ireland and Ireland have a pretty tumultuous history, but today it’s easy to travel back and forth from the two countries (for now… pre-Brexit). Northern Ireland is not only home to some of the world’s most beautiful landmarks but it’s also where a lot of Game of Throne’s was filmed.  We decided to take a day trip using Irish Day Tours from Dublin to check-out some of the highlights of Northern Ireland. 

The Dark Hedges

The Dark Hedges is most famous for being a filming location for Game of Thrones. It’s a long street of beech trees that make a tunnel like atmosphere. I was really excited to check this location out but the crowds of people really ruined the experience for me. It was still beautiful but I would suggest anyone who is able to check it out before tour buses arrive or after they leave for the day do that.

Carrick-a-rede Rope Bridge

Our second stop of the day was at the Carrick-a-rede Rope Bridge which is a bridge that connects the mainland to a tiny island called Carrickarede. It was first created by salmon fishermen in the 1700’s but has since been taken over by the National Trust and turned into a tourist attraction. It has great coastal views all around and on a clear day you can even see all the way to Scotland.

Giant’s Causeway

The main attraction of the tour was Giant’s Causeway. There are two tales about how this amazing rock formation came about.

The first legend says that a giant named Finn McCool living in Northern Ireland got angry with a giant living in Scotland. Finn created a path from Northern Ireland to Scotland to confront the other giant but when he got there realized that he was no match since the other giant was so large and went home. The Scottish giant followed him back but Finn’s wife disguised him as a baby to keep him safe. This led the Scottish giant to assume that if Finn’s baby was so big that would mean Finn was much larger. Therefore, the Scottish giant left and as he retreated he pulled up Finn’s original path only leaving the causeway we see today.

The second story is science based. The causeway was most likely created during the aftermath of a volcanic eruption cooling into 40,000 basalt columns. I like to believe the first legend though.

We were able to take a walking tour with some locals down the pathway to the causeway but because of this it felt like we didn’t have much time to explore before we had to head back up to the tour bus. In fact, we had less than 5 minutes by the time we reached the causeway before we had to make the 15 minute walk back up the hill to the bus. But, what we did see was amazing.  

Dunluce Castle

Our last stop of the day was at Dunluce Castle. Dunluce Castle was built sometime around 1400 and is now in ruins. It’s rumoured that the castle was inspiration for CS Lewis when he wrote Chronicles of Narnia. The castle was also a filming location for Game of Thrones. We had fun exploring the castle ruins and taking in the views of the coast.