Northern Ireland--Closkelt and Newcastle

After our day in Dublin, we headed up to Closkelt, Northern Ireland, a tiny, tiny village near Belfast. My friend from college, Heather, lives there, so we spent time visiting her and exploring the area.

Our first morning there, Sophie and I took a walk down the road, and here's what we saw:



The Irish countryside is full of cows, and Sophie loved them all:


A little baby cow would come up to Sophie if I stepped back...


And soon, she had half of the herd around her!


Heather was able to find a little Thomas the Tank Engine toy for Sophie, which she dragged around for the whole trip!


That afternoon, we decided to drive out to Newcastle, a beach town near Closkelt. I was elected to drive, although I had never driven on the left side of the road (or right side of the car before)! It was an adventure, but I have to say that I became quite the expert by the end of the trip!


So we drove out to Newcastle, and the first thing we saw was a beautiful rainbow:


There were all sorts of little "statues" along the boardwalk, and Sophie discovered all of them:



We also realized that although we've visited California several times (and even been in beach towns there), we've never taken Sophie to the beach! This was her first ocean beach experience, and she loved wandering around collecting shells...we have a little collection that she brought back with her!



Here she is proudly displaying her shells. We found many more hidden away in her jacket pocket when we got back to Closkelt!


It was quite chilly and a little rainy in Newcastle, so we stopped at a cafe that Heather suggested called Maud's. It was a very nice cafe full of windows overlooking the beach...perfect for rainy weather! Sophie had been begging for a doughnut for days (don't ask me why...we don't eat very many doughnuts!), and lo and behold, Maud's had some beautiful cake doughnuts with pink frosting and colorful sprinkles...a perfect snack for a little girl.

We headed back on the scenic route, which was beautiful, but we didn't get any pictures because I still wasn't used to driving, so I didn't want to stop! One of the last roads we were on was a two-lane country road. True to Ireland, traffic was stopped to let the farmers move the cows from one pasture to another!