The Causeway Coastal Route, from Belfast to Derry~Londonderry

The road along the Antrim coast

The Causeway Coastal Route follows the east and north coasts of Northern Ireland for nearly 200 kilometres, from Belfast to Derry~Londonderry. North of Larne, the Antrim Coast Road, cut into the rock between 1832 and 1842, runs right beside the waves, below cliffs of white chalk and then black basalt. It crosses the Glens of Antrim, green valleys that run down to the sea. At Glenariff, a path on wooden boardwalks leads to the waterfalls.

After Cushendun and its white cottages, a small single-track road climbs to Torr Head. This is the point of Northern Ireland closest to Scotland, which lies about twenty kilometres away. The road comes back down to Ballycastle, where the ferry leaves for Rathlin Island. Further on, the rope bridge at Carrick-a-Rede, 20 metres long, hangs 30 metres above the rocks.

Along the north coast come the Giant’s Causeway, the ruins of Dunluce and Mussenden Temple, above Downhill Strand. Derry, a walled city on the Foyle, is less than an hour away.

Near Belfast, Carrickfergus Castle was built in 1177 by the Norman knight John de Courcy. King William III landed there in June 1690.

At the end of the road, Derry has kept its walls from 1613–1619, which you can walk all the way round. They were never taken, not even during the siege of 1689, which lasted 105 days. Below the walls, the Bogside recalls a more recent history: the gable wall of Free Derry Corner and Bloody Sunday of 1972.

The Giant’s Causeway and its legend

The Giant’s Causeway has around 40,000 basalt columns, most of them six-sided. They were formed 50 to 60 million years ago, when a lava flow cooled and cracked. The site has been on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 1986. The cliff paths lead to other formations, such as the Organ and the Giant’s Boot.

According to legend, the Irish giant Finn McCool built it to go and fight the Scottish giant Benandonner. In one version, his wife dresses him up as a baby; seeing the size of the child, Benandonner imagines the size of the father and runs away, tearing up the causeway behind him. Similar columns appear in Scotland, on the island of Staffa, further north.

What not to miss

1. 1Titanic BelfastThe Titanic museum, opened in 2012 next to the slipways where the liner was built.
2. 2GlenariffThe “Queen of the Glens” of Antrim and its waterfalls.
3. 3Carrick-a-RedeThe salmon fishermen’s rope bridge, with the rocks 30 metres below.
4. 4The Dark HedgesAn avenue of beech trees planted around 1775, the Kingsroad in Game of Thrones, to explore on foot.
5. 5Ballintoy HarbourA small harbour at the foot of the cliff, which played the Iron Islands in Game of Thrones.
6. 6Mussenden TempleA round library, built in 1785 facing the sea by the Bishop of Derry.

The Causeway Coastal Route in pictures

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The keep of Carrickfergus Castle and fishing boats in the harbour.

Food on the Antrim coast

In the morning, you get an Ulster fry: eggs, bacon, sausages, soda farl and potato bread, all fried. In the small harbours, you eat salmon and seafood. At the end of August, the Ould Lammas Fair in Ballycastle sells dulse, a dried seaweed, and yellowman, a honeycomb toffee.

In Bushmills, you can visit the distillery. The date 1608 on its bottles refers to a licence to distil granted that year by King James I; the company dates from 1784. In Ireland, it is spelt whiskey, with an e; Scotland writes whisky.