Thursday 11th May: The significance of this army helicopter will become apparent in a moment!
I arranged to take Thursday off instead of my usual Friday as I am working tomorrow and it has turned out to be an absolutely cracking day, the hottest day of the year so far. Lilian and I decided to go geocaching up the Antrim coast near Cushendall. (Even packed swimming gear!) Stopped at Glenarm on the way up and had a walk round the castle grounds and had a look at the (Highland?) cattle.
Stopped at Waterfoot and had a coffee, (excellent coffee and very reasonably priced, recommended!) and watched all the bikers head up to the practice of the North West 200 which is on Saturday. If they get a day like this, they will be doing some speeds!
Eventually we headed on to try and find this geocache.
The cache was on the summit of Orra Mor which was the scene of the bloody Battle of Orra in 1559 between the O’Neills and the MacDonnells. The MacDonnells, being local, came up with a cunning plan and lured the O’Neills (and their henchmen the McQuillans) onto the boggy ground, where they floundered, and were easily finished off. A stone cairn raised by Sorley Boy MacDonnell, chief of the clan, to commemorate the battle still remains. (Right beside two mobile phone masts! Typical!) Hugh Phelim O’Neill and Daniel McQuillan’s graves are both on the slopes of the mountain. This is a fantastic spot with great views of Rathlin and Ballycastle and we had never been in this area before. I've come to realise recently that there is so much locally that I know little or nothing about!
Anyhow, found the cache and had lunch and then lay and dozed in the sun for a while before being awaked by an army helicopter hovering almost on top of us! Obviously they were checking out what two people were doing beside a comunications centre on a hilltop in the middle of nowhere! When I got the camera out and took his picture he cleared off but circled round and took another close look at us before deciding we were harmless and headed off towards Ballymena.
Made our way back down to the car again and slowly wended our way home in the evening sunshine. Smashing day out.