The Linda Letters by Gabriel O'Sullivan: Bushmills

13 May 2012

530

R. Linda:

So after a hardy Irish breakfast at the hotel we were all ready for day three or was it four? It became a blur much like the tour. I had noticed right off that our driver (who we all covertly called Speedy Gonzales), had a penchant for the gas pedal. And it seemed every time we came upon something of photographic interest, he'd speed up on purpose. I think everyone with a camera spent more time deleting blurred shots than doing anything else.

Joseph pulled up in a cleaned Mercedes that morning (I suppose he decided it needed a good airing out after carrying around all the 'Protestants' in the backseats and the one next to him), so he was ready to go. We had discussed this phenomenon of speeding the night before when we all FINALLY had dinner together. Well, seems Dragon forgot herself and greeted Joseph with, "Top of the morning Mr. Gonzales."

Yes, we all just stood there aghast for a moment but lucky for us Speedy didn't recognise the name and thought she was referring to someone else (as there were doormen and service staff mucking about, though no one who looked like a Gonzales in sight!). Anyway, with a collective sigh of relief, we got into the cleaned vehicle and set off for the Glens of Atrim, with a stop scheduled at the Bushmills Distillery and oh yeah Carrickfergus Castle (not a biggy on me agenda). Well OK, I thought to meself, that be a lot of driving through Bally this and Bally that, and I had noticed the heather hadn't bloomed yet, it was still a lovely shade of brown, so those magnificent purples would not be gracing the landscape or our photographs, but what the heck.

We wound our way out of Belfast and were skirting along the lough and on up to Carrickfergus. Now to be honest this castle, big as it is, be not exciting. There be not much in it, and they did try to dress it up with a few statues of red-coated soldiers inside, but for the most part, it isn't anything to write home about. But I said nothing, I thought well, it be the Abdullah Family Tour so I kept me gob shut and went along with it. And I AM writing home about it in spite of meself.

We pulled up to the ancient Norman monstrosity and were told to get out, stretch our legs, find something to snack on if we so desired and our driver would wait in the parking lot. We had just had breakfast, none of us were hungry, so we told Speedy we were going IN to go see the castle, in which he said his other spiel, "You'll have to pay for that, it isn't on the tour." It seemed to me it WAS, but I didn't have the literature with me and for a couple pounds each, what was the big deal? So we left him, kind of stunned we'd go on a self-tour of the castle. I guess other groups say, "Oh that's ok, let's move on." But not us. We will see everything! We don't care if we have seen it before, or not, we are getting our tour money worth one way or the other or HER name isn't Dragon Abdullah!

It had rained the night before so everything was soggy and the sky overcast, just the right atmosphere to be bored out me mind. We walked up to the gent forever preserved on a pedestal and the first thing very noticeable was his height . . . and the rather oversized hat . . . and the big feet! He was a short man, very short and he was none other than the bane of all Irishmen, King William the Third. Everyone was remarking how short and squat he was.

"What a funny-looking statue," Dragon quipped as we walked up to it.

"You know what they say about short men with big hats," I said.

I finally got a laugh! Gees what a group. So here are some Castle Carrickfergus photos courtesy of Tonya.

Gloomy old Castle Carrickfergus

Yeah don't laugh, but there he be short guy, big hat, big feet and probably a big nose . . . King Willie 3 LOL -- I be sure a Catholic sculpted the thing how otherwise would you explain the fact that the statue looks so comedic?

We strolled around until there was nothing more of it to see and came back to our tour van to find Speedy glancing at his watch. Oh boy, time to make up, LOL. So we piled in, fastened seat belts tight, gripped the armrests with white knuckles and off we set at warp speed! Me da had told us at dinner that Speedy was reaching speeds of 140mph and had actually hit 160! It wasn't any wonder that our first Bally (Bally means settlement) was Castle and it went speeding by so fast I don't remember it, just the road sign somewhere with blurry letters announcing it was 2K and that's it (or was that Ballymena? I dunno it was all a blur, excuse the pun). Here let me post some pictures in here for you so you can enjoy the speed we did trying to view the Glens.

Yeah, you have to look closely you can JUST make out some of the glens over the blurry roadside

How we got this I dunno, I guess just lucky but at least the weather was getting better

As the sun came out we managed this with a panoramic camera Tonya cropped the speeding roadside foliage

Somehow we managed the nine glens but Speedy never said what valley or Bally we were in to keep a count. I be thinking we saw six glens not nine though we did get to Carnelough, but instead of visiting the waterfall there, well, we looked across the water at Scotland . . . longingly.

Carnlough -- the port side

Ee-yah that be Scotland WAY out there. A couple of us actually thought of swimming to it just to escape our driver

Once we had our fill of Carnlough (oh yeah) and stretched our legs, and got a snack (yes we did by that time), we got back in the shiny Mercedes and headed off for our next "tour" the Bushmills Distillery of which I was in sore need of a few shots of the stuff by that time. Actually, all of us were in dire need.

But first, we got into Bushmills and the photo op of the cliffs by the sea beckoned. I had our driver pull over so we could decide whether we were going to attempt the rope bridge to the flat cliff in the sea. Well, no one but me daredevil wife wanted to attempt it.

"You CANNOT let her go alone Gabriel," the Dragon commanded me.

So with reluctance, I followed Ms. Tonya out and we trekked down the slope which was a ways to the bridge. Yes, we did, me trying to talk her arse out of this folly the entire way down, but NO, she was going to do it even if the bridge came loose and plunged us to the gorge below. She's cute that way. Made me nervous by just suggesting such.

But it got better we argued about who was going across first when it was decided for me that it would be ME. So I started going across as the wind was whipping in me face and the two people in front of me decided they wanted their picture taken! BY ME! All of us were suspended on that damn bridge! What could I say? So I took the camera and snap, snap and we continued on. It be just me luck I get meself psyched to go and someone thinks it perfectly fine to have ME take THEIR picture on a rope bridge, swinging in the wind, with a very deep drop below. WHO DOES THAT? (See photo below.)

That's me holding up the line on the left side of pic taking a photo of two lovebirds - YUP - and to make it worse I met someone coming BACK and I had to hold onto one side of the bridge hoping it didn't flip in that direction and down we all would go. Yeah, good time.

Continuing onward

The folks at the van watched us and provided these two glorious shots of us going across the bridge for your viewing enjoyment so it will stay branded in me memory for all time. Right then. And to add insult to injury, when we got to the other side Ms. Tonya realised she had forgotten her camera! So it was all for freaking nothing that I risked the loss of life and limb, not to mention totting her camera backpack on me back, further offsetting me balance! What be up with that I ask you. WOMEN!

We admired the view for a few minutes and then she said, "Come on let's go."

Ok so I trekked ten minutes to the rope bridge, took a precarious and slow (while holding tight to the lines) pace across it, and got to the other side to find we had no camera to take photos of a spectacular view, that we risked our necks for, we stand there for all of three minutes, and she's done. Let's go. There she was, been there, done that, got the t-shirt, time to go! So that meant Gabriel followed the feisty Tonya BACK across that bloody deep gorge on a rope bridge that was swinging in the wind and the wind was now at our backs where it was noticeably pushing us forward. Oi, Oi, OI! I do not remember getting to the other side but I must have because I closed me eyes so I wouldn't have to look DOWN. I don't recommend doing that, because with eyes closed balance changes. I'll leave the rest to your imagination. It be awful to say I was saved by a girl from me blind man's bluff across an open gorge, but the sharp sound of Tonya's voice "Gabriel Aloysius O'Sullivan! OPEN YOUR EYES BEFORE YOU GO OVER THE SIDE!" certainly snapped me eyelids open to find I was leaning to one side and could have flipped meself over with ease and been no more but gorge food. Or rook food. Whatever.

Once back to the Speeding Bullet Tour van we sped off to the village of Bushmills. Oh here's a factoid, the rope bridge is IN Bushmills it isn't a way to the distillery. For some reason, everyone thinks that. But think about it, if THAT was the way in, HOW would they get all those whiskey barrels out? Hum? You see me point? This was something the Dragon had thought we needed to do to get to the distillery and I kept telling her there was another way because the lorries had to go back and forth and they certainly weren't crossing on a rope bridge to a sea cliff. Oi!

We arrive at Bushmills Distillery

Our tour guide for Bushmills was the worst tour guide I've ever come upon. It was the most painful tour EVER. She said she was new, but both me da and I didn't think it was being new that had her confused, but that she had been inhaling the fumes of Bushmills whiskey all day, all week, maybe even all month for all we knew. As soon as you step foot in the place, they ask you NOT to take photos inside or out because the camera flash could cause an explosion. Yup, the fumes were so great not only could we smell the whiskey, we could TASTE it. I think by the time the tour was over everyone on the tour was high and we hadn't touched a drop of the liquid gold.

At one point the area where the distilling begins was so hot I thought Dragon was going to pass out. The guide did tell us if we found it too unbearable we could go outside and she'd have someone pick us up. Dragon opted to continue, what a trooper the woman is, but let's be honest she was enjoying the buzz she was getting from the atmosphere itself. But the problem was the guide spoke very slowly and I thought we'd come to a slow boil and meltdown if she didn't get to the end of her spiel for that room. I have never in me life felt so uncomfortably warm and high at the same time. I could not make a decision as to what to do.

Just when I thought I would be the weinnie who raised his hand to be let out of the intense sauna-like heat, she moved on. But not before stopping JUST before the door (which delayed the cooler air coming me way) to turn around and say, "I don't noo wut's wrong wit me. Me brain be way ahead of me tongue." I won't tell you what me thoughts were at the time, I'll leave that to you knowing me well to figure it out.

Somehow we managed a long, boring, rather distracted discourse on the distilling of Bushmills Whiskey. When the doors opened out of the distillery and into the whiskey bar/restaurant, we came busting out of there like a herd full of cattle thirsting for water. In our case WHISKEY! We got a free dram of the stuff and then sat down for some serious partaking of the beverage known as BUSHMILLS.

Now that I think back on it, maybe our guide was a plant to make us so bone dry that we'd be buying up the beverage on the rocks afterwards. Hum. Here are a few more shots of the distillery taken inside out and guess what? We didn't blow up. However, there truly was that possibility of starting a fire INSIDE the distillery making vats.