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CARRICKFERGUS |
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Heading past Belfast's northern suburbs, the A2 skirts the edge of
Belfast Lough before reaching CARRICKFERGUS , an unremarkable seaside
town (though with a recent reputation for Loyalist violence) whose
seafront is dominated by its only real point of interest, Carrickfergus
Castle (April-Sept Mon-Sat 10am-6pm, Sun 2-6pm; July & Aug opens at noon
on Sun; Oct-March Mon-Sat 10am-4pm, Sun 2-4pm; £2.70), one of the
earliest and largest of Irish castles. Built on a rocky promontory above
the harbour around 1180 by the Anglo-Norman invader John de Courcy (and
garrisoned until 1928), it reflects the defensive history of this entire
region. In 1315, it endured a year's siege before falling to the
combined forces of Robert and Edward Bruce, after which it was retaken
and held by the English for most of the next three centuries. In 1760,
the castle was overwhelmed by a French force and hurriedly recaptured;
and, in 1778, the American privateer, John Paul Jones, fought a
successful battle with the British vessel HMS Drake - this was America's
first naval victory, and the story runs that Belfast citizens (most of
the Protestants were sympathetic to the American Revolution) rushed out
to cheer the victors. The castle has now been restored and is peopled
with alarming life-size figures plucked from various moments of its
history - including King John in the garderobe. You can buy a joint
ticket (£4.85) for the castle and a trip on the Knight Ride (April-Sept
Mon-Sat 10am-5.30pm, Sun noon-5.30pm; Oct-March same days till 4.30pm;
£2.70), a short walk away in the Heritage Plaza on Antrim Street . A
monorail journey in a huge Norman helmet through Carrickfergus history
from 581 AD when noble Fergus was shipwrecked on a rock ( carrick) , the
ride bombards you with sound, smells and sights. A smell of another kind
hits you at the Gasworks Museum (June-Aug Sun 2-5pm; £1.50), on Irish
Quarter West, the only complete Victorian coal-fired gasworks in Ireland,
lovingly restored by local enthusiasts, which helped to power the town's
lighting, including the surviving Big Lamp at the end of the High Street.
Otherwise, Carrickfergus and its environs claim plenty of literary
associations , though not all of them are tangible: the Restoration
dramatist William Congreve lived in the castle as a young child (his
father was a soldier); Jonathan Swift's first sinecure was at Kilroot,
just outside Carrickfergus, where, between 1694 and 1696, he wrote The
Tale of a Tub . The chemicals firm ICI bought the land and levelled
Swift's thatched cottage in the 1960s; they have since moved on. Poet
Louis MacNeice (1907-63) spent a miserable childhood in Carrickfergus;
he says sourly of the town: "The Scotch Quarter was a line of
residential houses / But the Irish Quarter was a slum for the blind and
halt" ( Carrickfergus , 1937). The Protestant son of a local Home Rule
cleric, MacNeice was repelled equally by Orange bigotry and the
complacency found in the Republic. Although he was educated in England,
where he became associated with the Auden-led left-wing poets of the
1930s, his upbringing indelibly tinged his poetry and character. In
Valediction (1934), he explored his ambiguous feelings towards his roots:
"I can say Ireland is hooey& But I cannot deny my past to which myself
is wed / The woven figure cannot undo its thread." The rectory on North
Road - from which his mother was committed to an asylum - no longer
stands. Instead the MacNeice Fold on the same spot offers sheltered
accommodation and a plaque on its walls proclaims the connection. In the
town centre overlooking Market Place, the Church of St Nicholas , patron
saint of mariners and children, where MacNeice's father ministered (open
mornings only), was built by John de Courcy in 1205 - like many of the
castles and historic buildings hereabouts - but extensively reworked in
1614. Some interesting features set it apart: a leper's window, a "skew",
or crooked aisle, symbolizing Christ's head on the cross falling to the
right and, in the porch, a Williamite bomb fired in 1689.
Still, none of these claims to fame is as tenuous as that of the
connection with the American president Andrew Jackson, whose parents
emigrated from Carrickfergus in 1765. The Andrew Jackson Centre (April,
May & Oct Mon-Fri 10am-1pm & 2-4pm, Sat & Sun 2-4pm; June-Sept Mon-Fri
10am-1pm & 2-6pm, Sat & Sun 2-6pm; £1.20), two miles north of
Carrickfergus on the Larne Road, isn't even their home, but a
reconstruction of an eighteenth-century thatched cottage, with a little
museum. Next door is something slightly more substantial - the US
Rangers' Centre (same hours and ticket), which celebrates the formation
of the first Battalions of this American Commando force in 1942 from US
troops based in the North and trained at Carrickfergus.
One reason to give Carrickfergus a little more time might be the annual
fair , Lughnasa , which is tackily medieval - with wrestlers, archers,
minstrels and people dressed up as monks - but great fun nonetheless.
It's held at the end of July; check the dates with the tourist office at
the Heritage Plaza on Antrim Street (April-Sept Mon-Fri 9am-6pm, Sat
10am-6pm; July & Aug also Sun noon-6pm; Oct-March Mon-Fri 9am-5pm; tel
028/9336 6455).
If you do want to stay , there's a scattering of hotels around,
including the central, family-run Dobbins Inn Hotel , 6 High St (tel
028/9335 1905; www.dobbinshotel.co.uk ; £55-70) and the Mediterranean-style
Quality Hotel , 75 Belfast Rd (tel 028/9336 4556; £70-90), while for B&B
there's Langasgarden on the seafront at 72 Scotch Gardens (tel 028/9336
6359; £33-40) or The Tramway House , 95 Irish Quarter South (tel
028/9335 5639; £33-40), a Victorian town house opposite the Marina. The
hotels offer the best eating options, though other good bets include
Chandler's Wine Bar , 13 High St, for reasonably priced European cuisine
and there's a plethora of cafés, fast-food outlets and inexpensive
Chinese and Indian restaurants. This is also golf and fishing country.
Carrickfergus Golf Club (tel 028/9336 3713), on North Road west of the
town centre, is an eighteen-hole parkland course with great views to
Scotland and over the Mourne Mountains. Whitehead Golf Club (tel
028/9335 3792), half a mile north of town at McCrea's Brae, also offers
distracting views and a challenging course over varied terrain. If you
want to go fishing, you can rent boats at Carrickfergus or fish off the
rocks and piers along the coast.
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