August 26th - Bank holiday, Ireland surf holiday - "Too small to go in"!

So the bank holiday finally arrives. Friday I drive back to London to meet Stu & Mel, Paula & Paul, Mel, Kate & others for a drink. Saturday I catch the train to Cardiff for the Snow Patrol gig in Coopers field with Davey, Liz, Andy & Tom.
Think Snow Patrol are "OK", the gig was good.


The next day we started the dreaded journey to Belfast - the 8 hour drive to Stranraer ferry port. Ugh!
We get to Daveys parents (who are very sweet) at about half 10.
Daveys dad cooked us an awesome Ulster fry before we headed off to Donegal coast, Rossanowlagh.
Town hall - Belfast...

I took some Photo's along the way.

A mountain near streedagh strand...


We managed to pitch up in a caravan site just as everyone was leaving as a weather front was due in!
We still managed to get the Barbie going before it chucked it down!

Ireland is well known for HUGE surf, we visited all the main spots on the coast & it was too small to go in! ;-)

Yup it was flat...

(Narin beach)
flat...

flat!

(East strand, Portrush, Causeway coast)

Meanwhile it was "going off" on the Devon & Welsh beaches! Quite funny looking back but gutted at the time!
To be fair, the first night there was a messy 1ft wave at Rossanowlagh.
Spot the lone surfer out - it was VERY windy & a long paddle out - He was a better man than me!!!

Also we did go in for a surf the next day at Streedagh strand but it was "totally closing out dude" & still only 1ft (its the first time I've seen a 1ft close out! Very funny!) with the odd 2ft set.


So this is where the boards stayed most of the holiday - in the bags or on the roof.
(Picture at streedagh after our surf)



Again to be fair we did Surf Port Ballintrae later in the hols on the causeway coast.
It was 3ft-5ft! However locals hogged the break & it was impossible to get on the wave - Davey managed to catch one on his fish & do a "bottom turn". I nearly caught one on the shortboard but pulled out for fear of running a body boarder over!

Port Ballintrae on a flatter day as I was too excited to take a picture on the day surf arrived for just that day!...



So we headed for Portrush - with no surf at least we could get pissed!
We stayed in a dive at Portrush. It was £8 a night!
We got a shit surf in (.5-1ft) at west strand, but this was cool as an airshow rehearsal was going on & we got pulled over by the "Surf Police"!! This made our day!
Wish I took my waterproof camera in with me for evidence!

We went to the local pub on the Friday & made friends with the locals & Kelly's night club on Saturday.

Sunday we watched the airshow at Port rush from the balcony at the hostel we were staying at.


Heres some clips of the red arrows..

clip1

clip2







Here they are in perfect formation

So, with no surf it was time to do some site seeing. We checked out Port Ballintrae just in case on the monday as troggs surf report said there maybe something - Lying bastards!!!
To be fair even the flags wee confused about the wind direction at Port Ballintrae....

Ofshore or onshore?


OK, OK!! No, surf - get over it!!
We headed to Carrick-a-rede rope bridge.
The view on the way...


This pic of a very nervous tourist crossing the bridge...


Next it was off to the Giants Causeway...

Start of the walk...

Past the Giant's Organ (Ooer!!)


Here's the causeway side on..


The rocks on the causeway up close are pretty cool, super cooled infact! Its molten rock which was solidified by the ocean thus its amazing shape.

One more..


Davey had to illegaly park in the middle of the road so I could take this pic of Dunluce castle...

I took this pic so you could read about the history of the sights we saw..


It was a great holiday in the end davy did most of the driving while I took all the pic's...


All good things come to an end as we drive onto the ferry home...