Rounding the Ards Peninsula

This week we moved to an apartment by the sea in Bangor, Northern Ireland (i.e. not Wales or Maine). The first thing we noticed is the high concentration of luxury cars in the area. In a ten-minute walk I saw two Ferraris, a Mini convertible, a Maserati SUV and several Audis, BMWs and Mercedes. It’s not that I’m interested in cars, either, it’s just quite a big change from the city, where if a family owns a car at all it tends to be a pretty nondescript vehicle.

Though only 12 miles from Belfast, Bangor is in another sense very far away. There are no more brick row-houses decorated with moss and creeping damp, no more Union Jacks and political banners, no more Strongbow beer and bookies. Here the houses are painted primary colors and decorated with tasteful fake-antique signs. The dogs are groomed and dressed in quilted coats. There’s even a gift shop on the main street called Boodle and Doodle (or something like that) selling cutesy items like silver cork-holders and signs making a claim for ‘Poshest House in Bangor’.

Our front window is large and everyone who passes by on the promenade can (and does) look in, but the obverse of that is we have a great view. From the sofa we can see across Belfast Lough all the way to Carrickfergus, the town of the eponymous song, which boasts its own Norman Castle. Throughout the day, depending on the angle and intensity of the sun, the lough adjusts its colour from aquamarine to turquoise to slate. Skirting the coast, sharp rocks stick up, slick with brine and decorated with the occasional vein of quartz. Gulls hover, bob on the sea or roost on the rocks depending on their mood and little fluff-bellied shore birds poke about among the rocks. They’re some kind of small sandpiper, maybe little stints or red knots, which cluster together and seem almost invisible against the rocks.

Yesterday I went for my first run in the area, not knowing exactly what I’d see but ready to be socked with a heavy dose of negative ions. It was about 8 degrees Celsius and blowing a gale, so I put on my woollen hat and raincoat and hoped for the best. Almost immediately I was glad I did because the immersion of senses

About half a mile along the road I got to Ballyholme Bay, site of a small yacht club and also a popular place to swim . Although it’s most popular in the summer, there are a few groups that swim all year round and the local Baptist church even dips its new recruits here when the time comes to baptise a member. Today there was no one swimming that I could see, but there were plenty of dog walkers. At the far end of the curve of the bay was a stretch of sandy beach, covered with slippery kelp that smelled fresh and salty, reminding me of the New Zealand beaches I used to walk on in the weekends. On one side of the beach was a rocky wall artfully constructed with giant flintheads on top.

Where the sandy stretched stopped there was a stile leading to a wild muddy path. A sign enjoining dog walkers to restrain their dogs suggested that it was a public access path so I decided to see where it led. The coast here was very pretty, with grass growing right to the shore, the black rocks patched with bright yellow lichen and the invisible birds whose presence I didn’t guess until I heard their warning cry, occasioned by my feet slopping through the mud.

Retreating from the coast I found the path went through a tunnel of gorse, another reminder of New Zealand. A native European plant, some early settlers brought it to New Zealand to use it as a wind-breaking hedges. Unfortunately it did a little bit too well in that fragile island ecosystem and has long been considered a pest there.

Rounding the bend, I found myself in Groomsport, whose name in Irish is Port an Ghiolla Ghruama (Port of the Gloomy Servant). Intriguingly, it may have once been a Viking settlement as pieces of jewelry have been found in the area. Groomsport has its own little bay and on a clear day you can see Scotland across the sea. As I jogged past the little park by the shore, I saw a man making his way slowly along the path as his dog scampered around with an orange ball in its mouth.

At this point I decided it was time to go back to Bangor but I didn’t want to get my feet cold and muddy again so instead of returning around the coast I took the road, which luckily had a sidewalk. I have had some regrettable experiences on Irish roads that have nothing in the way of a verge so that once I had to climb a tree to get out of the way to avoid traffic. This road was unexpectedly pretty and I had one of those great moments that come to you when you stumble on something beautiful. Now that it is November, the trees are either yellow or bare and either way they look very striking.

After this it got pretty suburban and I didn’t take many pictures. To make a long story short, I ended up back in Bangor in a high wind ready for a hot beverage.