Margaret River Part 2

by Miss Penny Black

Our second full day in MR was a tour called ‘All About Margaret River Wine and Chocolate Tour’, which was accurate but not very catchy. The company was just two guys, Dani was our drive for the day and he was from Chile, having moved to Australia four years ago. If you’re looking for a tour in the MR region, I’d highly recommend this one. Dani was an excellent guide who was friendly, knowledgeable and passionate about the region and supporting the smaller, family-owned businesses that were resisting the big companies that are buying up smaller wineries.

We were picked up from our apartments and joined a retired couple from Sydney, two sisters from Norway, and a couple of retired ladies from England. Everyone was very friendly and it was a great group to spend the day with, even if the couple from Sydney didn’t believe me when I told them the birds we could see at the farm were peacocks, not lyrebirds. I’ll let you be the judge.

First stop was a farm experience where we fed llamas, emus and then sat down for a breakfast of scones and tea or coffee. Something to fill the stomach before the wine tasting started!

We also stopped at Cowerup, a little tourist town we had already had a quick walk around the day before, to visit a chocolate maker called Temper Temper. They did some unusual flavours, including one with cauliflower!

They actually made the chocolate on the premises from imported cocoa beans. I don’t think I’ve seen anywhere else in Australia that does that on such a small scale.

We had one wine tasting before lunch, where we sat outside in the garden of Juniper Winery, where an enthusiastic Englishman told us each wine was excellent. None of them really took my fancy, but it was a beautiful place to start our day’s drinking.

We stopped briefly at a lookout where I saw a whale spout in the far distance – I got very lucky on this trip with spotting the puffs of water out near the horizon, although sadly we didn’t see any close to land.

Lunch was at an olive farm and restaurant. We had ordered our food earlier so service was quick and we got to try their range of oils and preserves. Charmaine and I shared a mushroom pasta (divine) and delicious bruschetta before heading off to the next two wineries.

Winery 2 was a small producer and the lady who talked us through their wines was one of the owners. She was very knowledgeable and I found trying their rosé interesting as she gave us two samples, produced from the same grapes in two different years. Not only was the taste very different, but the colour was striking – one was a pale warm tawny and the other was a cool pink!

The third winery of the day was extremely generous with their tasting selection and we ended up ordering a mixed case sent home. In their vineyard I saw the biggest flock of black cockatoos I’ve ever seen – at least 30. At home we get the ones with yellow stripes under their tails, but these had white stripes.

Luke, Charmaine and I said goodbye to the group at about 4pm and had a little rest before going to the weirdest building on the main street, it was a bit steam-punk/cuckoo clock style. The guy at the front desk seemed mildly perturbed that we’d arrived without a booking but the food was great.

The restaurant had lots of little spaces, not one big room. I recommend going there if you go to MR… but make a booking!

It’s two restaurants plus accommodation all in one premises.

Day 3! 22/9/25 Coffee, Art, A Beach And Chocolate

Our last full day in Margaret River. I woke up early and went for a little solo walk. I find if I don’t spend at least a bit of time by myself when I’m on holidays I go mad. Or rather, I get mad and Luke bears the brunt. So I went and had a coffee in a little cafe that was also a health food shop and I watched people coming in and out. Then I walked back to the apartments and realised Luke might like a coffee so I got one for him from a bakery on the main street that had the best looking pastries I’ve seen in a long time. I didn’t end up going back for any, which I’m a bit sad about!

Luke and I took a walk after breakfast and had a look at some street art, and at a gallery nearby. It had an exhibition by Yorkshire artist, Chris Williamson, who did illustrations for children’s books, but also had little sculptures on the wall next to each original pice and you could look in the drawing for the sculpture. His work was very intricate and beautiful.

We met up with Charmaine and our next stop was the Elephant Beach Cafe. it’s the only cafe in the area that is right on the beach and it had a magnificent view of the beach, cliffs and emerald green water. We watched the wait staff whisk all the plates away to avoid attracting the seagulls that plague every outdoors space.

We walked up to the headland and looked further along the coast. There was an interesting rock formation under the water where seaweed had filled in the cracks, making tessellating shapes. I was very glad of my sunglasses, everywhere in Margaret River is so blinding!

Astonishingly, Charmaine didn’t suffer any injuries on this trip. Maybe the curse has lifted!

In the afternoon we visited two chocolate shops. The first was the Margaret River Chocolate Company, which is big but I didn’t find their range of produce very interesting.

We visited a smaller business nearby that had a smaller selection but talked us through a tasting of chocolate from different regions around the world. We could taste the difference between African and South American chocolate and bought some to take to Rottnest Island for our friends to try.

Our last stop of the day was back to Cowaramup (again) and we managed to find, in the tiny strip of shops, two shops we hadn’t previously visited. We bought some cheese and ended up having a lovely evening on our balcony drinking some of the wine we’d bought and eating the cheese with some relish and crackers. This always reminds me of Luke’s parents, Lea and Pete, and their long evenings of cheese and chatting!

Busselton Jetty, Thursday September 25/9/25

We left Margaret River before 8am, still being on Melbourne time. Poor Charmaine was still waking up at 2am!

As always, we turned up quite early, and had time for breakfast at The Goose, a cafe right by the tourist office in Busselton. Another restaurant with a beautiful view and the weather was perfect.

Always Luke chooses dessert for breakfast!

We boarded the little train that ran along the pier and had a chat to a nice family who recommended a place with sunset views in Fremantle the following night. I booked a table straight away.

The trip along the jetty was nice but the underwater observatory at the end was really my cup of tea! A circular cement structure with windows along a the way that circled down, and you could look through at the ecosystem that had built a reef on the jetty pylons.

Going scuba diving out here would be amazing! There’s an underwater sculpture garden too, although we couldn’t see it. Several days previously two young blue whales had been swimming around the jetty – sadly not on our day!

The reef has only been growing for a few years but there’s so much to see.

We decided to walk back and were glad or our hats and long sleeves, the sun felt quite spicy.

Feeling like we’d done everything we needed to do, we got in the car and headed for Fremantle.

We had booked rooms at a Rydges hotel that had once been an old pub. It had a beautiful veranda around the outside but the inside was more modern and cavernous.

Kelvin has flown in that afternoon so Charmaine went to meet him. Luke and I had a couple of drinks in the bar then walked through the park to the Bathers Beach restaurant. There were some very photogenic tugboats in the harbour next door and an octopus sculpture too.

One of my favourite photos from the trip

Bathers Beach itself isn’t large but a few people were gathered for the sunset. Inside the restaurant it was a bit blinding, but the food was good and we shared a bunch of small plates.

Apart from a huge, empty Ferris wheel, there wasn’t much going on around our hotel at night so after a couple of drinks in the bar we headed to bed, still somewhat on Victorian time.

Next stop: Rottnest Island!

1Jul2025

Goodbye Khao Lak, Hello Phuket

by Miss Penny Black

While I was only staying in Thailand for eight days, Jess was moving digs to Phuket, for a change of pace and scenery.

We enjoyed our last breakfast at The Sands, I had a last swim in the pool and we finally bought one of the tiny cute ice creams they sold in front of the gym.

I forgot to take the photo before I bit off the ear.

It takes about two hours to get to Phuket’s Old Town from Khao Lak, so we left The Sands at about midday. Jess has been the organiser of the trip, and for once I get to play the travel princess, which has been very enjoyable! Although knowing someone else has all the info meant I asked her the same questions repeatedly and my brain did not retain anything. What a strange phenomenon!

Jess booked us a taxi through Grab, which is like Uber. The fancy Grab car cost the same as a regular car and it was amazing!

The interior had lights all over and even fancy tassels for the curtains

There was a bit of traffic on the way so we got to Jess’ hotel, the Mid Town Hotel, a bit later than expected. Rather unusually, it used to be a shopping mall, so the layout was kind of interesting.

After dumping our bags and turning on the aircon, we headed out into Old Phuket, which has Portuguese history and beautiful architecture. It was a little New Orleans, Nottingham Hill and Bangkok all rolled into one.

Our first stop, for something fun to do, was a Japanese icecream place that did a weird noodle-shaped topping on icecream in a cone.

We got to watch the guy do the noodles and wondered what on earth they were made from before Jess googled it. Turns out they’re a ‘Mount Blanc’ dessert, invented in Paris 100 years ago and loved by the Japanese. The strands are made of flavoured chestnut paste!

We must, must remember to save our energy for the evenings next time! The afternoon was so hot and humid, I couldn’t stand being in the sun. We walked through some cooler market alleys and then Jess navigated us to an air conditioned coffee shop for a drink while we worked out somewhere to go for dinner.

Markets getting started. Not too busy at 5pm

Jess found a restaurant that was almost in view of the coffee shop and we went to see if it was a decent temperature.

The wait staff kindly put on the aircon for us and we gladly sat in the gorgeous decor: the place had been described online as having a French influence. It had a cement floor but the decor was all teal velvet drapes and cushions, marble tabletops and purple walls with giant disco balls revolving slowly. I loved it!

We had some simple but delicious Thai food and then walked back to the hotel and lay in the aircon. Jess has definitely not suffered anywhere near as badly as I have with the temperature and humidity, which I think is exacerbated by the city environment (and not having a pool handy) and possibly perimenopause.

Despite the discomfort, I really liked what I saw of Phuket. I don’t know why I’d previously imagined it as a soulless tourist trap. The markets did have stalls selling lots of the same things over and over, but I could imagine coming here with a group of friends and having an amazing time just visiting all the fun and unusual bars and restaurants. Being a pride month, this really is a good time to come. I think we missed the initial celebrations by one day, I’m not sure if they have a parade to kick it off.

I took a Grab car to the airport and arrived in plenty of time. After throwing away my water bottle at security, I bought some water for the plane then they had a second security set up as we boarded and I had to throw away the new bottle, which I wasn’t happy about. I read later there had been some bomb threats in Phuket in the previous two days. I don’t know how a clear bottle of water bought in the cafe inside the airport was a threat but there you go.

Jess hadn’t cancelled her return flight as it was part of a package so I had an empty seat next to me – what a luxury! I slept most of the at home, caught the Skybus then a train and was home around lunchtime. Luke was working from home so he picked me up, made me a sandwich and then I went to bed and slept for another five hours.

A rare gang of yellow-tailed black cockatoos were destroying a pine tree when I got off the train at Heathmont. So cute but so violent!

Corch and Leah’s favourite restaurant, the Afghan Kitchen, was closing down so they brought over a feast for dinner and it was lovely to catch up with them. Kat and Luke had saved two weeks of the Saturday quiz and we did them while we had dessert. Trivia with friends – one of my favourite things!

I slept for another six or so hours then it was time to get up, go back to the airport and fly to Queensland! More about that in the next post 🙂 .

26Jun2025

Jess and Amanda In Thailand, days 2-5

by Miss Penny Black

One of the best things about staying at an Asian resort is the breakfast buffet.

The buffet at our resort starts at 6:30 and our body clocks are several hours behind Thai time, which meant we are usually first seated in the best spot in the ‘adults only’ zone by 7am.

The food that Jess and I choose is a venn diagram with almost no overlap. Jess chooses a selection of toasts and jam then a bowl of yogurt and porridge, while I go for curry, eggs, bacon, salad, rice noodles…. literally a bit of everything else.

The coffee and tea cups at resorts are always tiny so I took one of my keep cups so I could make a bigger drink. It has the added benefit of being able to make a coffee then take it away and put it in the bar fridge in the room (I like cold coffee) for later in the day.

After the first few of days of buffet madness (first breakfast at 6:30 then second breakfast at 10:00 after yoga) , we’ve taken pity on our stomachs and slept in for longer and gone for only one breakfast today.

Our package with Luxury Escapes includes the daily breakfast, two other meals during our stay, two massages each, plus one free-flow cocktail hour every day. There’s two cocktail hours to choose from, one from 3-4 at the pool outside our room, and one from 6-7 near the main restaurant.

Map of the resort with our room where the red arrow points. The dark blue in the centre is a lake, not a pool. The aqua wing is where most of the families are most of the time. The resort is really well set out and keeps he kids

We’ve done most of our cocktail hours at the bar near our room, not only because it’s convenient, but also because we’ve become friendly with the bar staff there. They are very lively and we talk to one of the guys, Ton, who helps us learn Thai. So far we have mainly learned how to order a drink and explain how many drinks will lead to us being sick.

Cocktails aside, We did a language class on our second full day and Gabriel, the teacher, took us through some basic Thai phrases.

We have been practicing phrases and adding to our notes. Thai people are very kind and encouraging about us using as many words as we can.

We have done two yoga classes and also a fruit carving class!

We made tomato roses, cucumber leaves and carrot… tulips? The carrot was the hardest. Tomorrow we’re going to take the tiny carving knives that we were given as part of the class to breakfast and do the Michelin plate challenge, which is where you try to plate up buffet food to look like it came from a fancy restaurant. Then you get a member of staff to judge which is best.

Jess’ highlights so far:

Mango pudding

Warmer pool water (it was kind of cold when we first arrived)

Learning Thai, doing yoga and fruit carving

Having food made for her!

15Jul2023

One Night In London

by Miss Penny Black

We left Belfast around midday and flew to Luton, the only London airport I had yet to pass through. Our flight was the bumpiest I’ve had in years. I won’t blame EasyJet… but should I?

The trip from Luton into the city was straightforward and we had booked a nice-ish hotel, the NYX London for the final night of our trip.

It was very centrally located in Holborn, close the the British Museum and Seven Dials, where I was hoping to get in a final visit to the Gudrun Sjoden store.

The hotel foyer looking a bit like a Vegas casino.

We dropped off our bags in our room on the ninth floor. It wasn’t high enough to escape the traffic noises but it wasn’t too bad.

We had booked the hotel because it had a pool and I wanted one more holiday swim, but by the time we got there I couldn’t be bothered. We went out for a walk instead.

On our walk we had one of the more disturbing experiences of our trip. We were by the Thames and it was rush hour, with hundreds of cyclists going by every minute. We saw a man on a bike, who was probably in his late 50s and without a helmet, go sailing off his bike. He looked like he’d just fainted while in motion and he just sort of flew onto the road head first.

It was so shocking, we were about 20 metres away and a number of other cyclists immediately stopped to help him. We stood for a couple of moments to see if he’d wake up, which he did, and one of the cyclists called an ambulance. The whole sight was quite distressing and even now, two weeks later, I wonder how he is recovering.

I didn’t even know Twinings had a store. I meant to send this photo to Jess but forgot so here it is for you!

For dinner I did a search of local pubs and booked us a table at The Ship Tavern.

It turned out to be a great way to spend our last evening. We ordered a steak and ale pie for two and sat in a cosy booth drinking wine. Lovely!

Despite being in a tiny room the pub restaurant was full of character. The staff were lovely too.

After dinner we went back to the hotel to spend some of last £20 notes. We had a couple of fancy cocktails but then discovered they don’t take cash, which I hate – if it’s legal tender it should be accepted in businesses. We tried to spend it at the airport the next day and came across the same problem. So if anyone wants to buy £80 off me let me know!

Our flight the next day wasn’t until after 8pm, so we had a whole day to fill.

First up was the hotel’s buffet breakfast, which was quite nice. I forgot to take photos, which Mum will be happy about as she told me there were too many food photos in the blog.

We went for a walk around Seven Dials and Holborn.

There’s a public art space in the area that is a huge screen that wraps around 3 sides of a large undercover area and also covers the high ceiling. Anyone can walk in and it shows a range of artworks.

This is all screens, it was very entertaining.

I went back to my favourite store to find that there were lots of things on sale (yay!) but also lots of things sold out (boo!). I bought a bunch of patterned tops and bits and pieces and the lady gave me a discount if I promised to join the store club online, which took me two weeks but I eventually got around to it. She even remembered me from my previous visit! I don’t think they’d ever had anyone so excited to be there.

After that we went to see the new Wes Anderson movie.

We both agreed that it was the most Wes Anderson that Wes Anderson had ever Wes Andersoned.

Before and after the movie we spent some time in Foyles, a five storey book store with a fairly small sci-fi and fantasy section. I didn’t find anything I wanted but I thought this cover was funny.

Last stop was a drink and some food at a pub not far from the hotel. Unfortunately it was full of day office workers but we were happy to be indoors watching the rain come down.

Some extremely unhealthy snacks for our late lunch.

Eventually we went back to the hotel to collect our bags from storage and headed for Heathrow.

We decided to catch the new Elizabeth Line. The sign at Tottenham Court Road said all trains stopped at Heathrow, but once we got on I noticed it said it was going to Reading (pronounced Redding, just to be difficult). As I anticipated, the train did not stop at Heathrow.

We were very early, which was lucky as I might’ve had an aneurism if we had come near to missing our flight. It was also absolutely pouring with rain when we got off at the next stop. A rail worker on the platform told us there would be a bus nearby but we followed his directions and found no bus stop, nothing.

We ended up catching an Uber to Heathrow and the driver was very happy to have an airport fare, so I guess that was something!

At Heathrow we found a table at one of the bars and ordered some drinks to fortify us for our plane, which had been delayed past 9pm.

The flights weren’t too bad. We slept through most of the first flight, which was the longest (14 hours) and I slept through about half of the second flight.

The changeover in Korea was tiresome as we had to go through security again, despite not leaving that wing of the terminal. After sitting for so long a bit of standing was fine.

In line for security was a woman with a small white poodle. I’d never seen a pet in an airport before, it was kind of weird.

Apologies in advance – from now on there’s hardly any photos as I was too tired and not thinking. Plus there wasn’t much of interest to photograph!

The food on the flights was good and we had an empty seat next to us on the first leg. Luke was convinced we’d have the same on the second but ended up with a fellow next to us.

We arrived in Sydney around 7am to discover my bag was still in Seoul. Sigh. I filled out the paperwork and they estimated I’d have my bag within two days. It actually ended up taking six, rather annoyingly. I did have an AirTag on my bag though so I could, frustratingly, see it sitting at the terminal in Sydney for five of those days.

From Mascot we caught the airport train to central station then a train to Bankstown, following signs directing us to change there for trains to Lithgow. My brother was supposed to be meeting us there, which was very kind of him!

Sydney was a balmy 20 degrees Celsius, lovely! But as we got into the Blue Mountains things cooled down. We also discovered that this train, which a station attendant in Blacktown assured us went to Lithgow, actually stopped two stops earlier at Mount Victoria. You’d think we’d have learned not to trust rail employees by this stage!

Fortunately Michael was happy to drive a bit further to get us and we waited in a cafe to avoid the arctic winds. Luckily I’d put a cardigan in Luke’s bag!

We stopped for lunch in Bathurst then made it back to Michael’s place, where we both fell into bed. Luke was particularly exhausted, having been up for almost 24 hours at that stage.

We waited an extra night in Orange (hoping for my bag to be delivered – it wasn’t), and I had a catch up evening with friends, which was lovely, and spent some time with mum and dad.

Next stop was Albury. I think I was so pleased to be driving a car for the first time in three months that I got carried away and did the whole six hours. We stopped for lunch in Gundagai and I, rather pointlessly, took Luke to a lookout that was shrouded in mist.

We only ended up spending one night in Albury but it was lovely to see Luke’s family and on the following morning we stopped by Kath’s (Luke’s grandmother) to pick up some gigantic orchid pots to take back to Melbourne.

This turned out to be the most harrowing part of the whole cross-planet journey, as I had not really considered what would happen to all the cockroaches and beetles and various other bugs during the four hour drive.

It didn’t take long for them to start exploring the car and thank god Luke was driving or I’d probably have caused an accident. Eventually we made it home and, after giving the house a hug, we pulled the pots of the car and I emptied a can of fly spray into it to fumigate.

Bug drama aside (and what more Australian way could there be to arrive home, really?) we were very glad to be home. The only things left to do were pick up Bonnie, which we did the following morning, and wait for my bag.

Bonnie was predictably unenthused to see us.

If it wasn’t for the fact that we’d trained her to greet us calmly you’d think she didn’t want to leave Amanda and Matt and their three dogs. that’s what we told ourselves, anyhow.

My bag eventually arrived, only six days late.

Now life is almost back to normal. Luke has gone back to work on The Hundred with Andy Lee and I’m enjoying pottering around the house and having lunch with friends. Melbourne winter doesn’t seem so bad after staying in Orange for a few days and it’s mostly been sunny. Basically, if you can manage to be away from home long enough to enjoy getting back then I think you’ve hit the jackpot, travel-wise.

So that’s it for the blog until next time! to finish here’s some food photos of dishes I’ve made since I’ve got home that were inspired by my travels.

Are you looking for somewhere to eat in Greater London? Click here to try looking through recommendations on Restaurantji.co.uk.

29Jun2023

One Night In Derry

by Miss Penny Black

Our overnight trip to Derry did not begin well, due to the uniquely confusing setup at Lanyon Place Station. We managed to miss the 10am train and had to wait an hour for the next one. Annoying, but possibly meant we missed the morning rain in Derry.

The trip to Derry is about 2 hours and as we got closer the sun came out and we hit the coastal section of the route. Lovely!

There was even a stretch of beach that looked remarkably like home.

We arrived at Derry station a bit after 2 and the station was a pleasant surprise. Very modern, clean and bright.

The station is on the opposite side of the river to the centre of town so we walked across the Peace Bridge.

We’d booked an Airbnb property but only brought a small backpack each so we were fine to carry our things with us for a few hours.

On a day like this it was a nice way to enter the city, although it was still spitting a bit… but also sunny. So Irish!

There was a nice-looking walkway along the river but we headed into the city.

Not many people around, which is always nice.

We headed into the ground floor of the building below. I was interested in the stained glass. I read later that the windows tell the story of Derry through the centuries.

There was an exhibition on the history of Derry, which I can poorly but fairly accurately summarise as: English people arrive and ruin everything and the fighting goes on forever. Luke and I talked about this a lot, not just what happened but what could’ve been done differently, what might have happened if the English had never come. Ireland is so small that it might’ve been invaded by Spain or Portugal, or how different it would be if it had been left to itself. Is there even such a thing, in history, as a nation being left to itself?

I didn’t realise the English came to completely drive out the locals in the 1600s to set up plantations, much like those in the US and the Caribbean, although I think this happened first.

Next we visited the tourist information centre and picked up a map. They had a lot of Derry Girls merch and some interactive exhibits.

The craft village was recommended to visit, it’s a series of little craft shops that sell very typical Irish stuff, some more modern things and several hairdressers. Not the highlight of our visit but it might appeal to some.

The centre of Derry is surrounded by defensive walls, the mostly recently constructed in the UK and Ireland. They’re in excellent condition and the wall around is about a mile and offers an excellent view of the inside and outside parts of the city.

The wall walk was also surprisingly wide and the surface seemed quite new. There were sets of stairs along the way but it wasn’t a hard walk.

If I had more time I’d have looked for a walk to do in the hills around the city.

This area, Bogside, was where Bloody Sunday occurred. More on that later.

If you don’t immediately recognise these faces you need to watch Derry Girls immediately. Go do it now, I’ll wait.

After all the walking in the sun there was only one thing to do.

We stopped in at Peaddar O’Donnall’s for a drink and to listen to the old men at the end of the bar talk about what a good movie The Mighty Ducks was.

I had to photograph the place below. We didn’t eat there but I enjoyed their scattergun approach to punctuation.

Another photo of Northern Irish library architecture. It looks like a very defensible structure.

Before heading to the Airbnb we walked to the Free Derry area to have a look at the murals.

The old style, then the new below.

Our Airbnb was back over the peace bridge in the newer part of town.

After going through this door we had to let ourselves out the back door into a grim alley then down to a little apartment that was sparse but felt pretty new and was clean.

Plus they left us bread, butter and everything for tea and coffee so we were set. Back to the pub.

There were a bunch of pubs in a row so of course we went back to the same one we were at before. We had an hour to kill before dinner at Mekong, Derry’s top rated restaurant.

An unprepossessing exterior but the food was unreal. We ordered a range of smaller plates to share.

Vermicelli spring rolls, beef laarb balls, spicy sticky chicken wings, pork belly and glass noodle salad

The flavours were amazingly fresh and rich, with each dish having a unique taste but all tasting very Vietnamese. It was really hard to pick a favourite.

Dessert was a mandarin crème brûlée with ginger biscuit, which we used to dip in the brûlée and then crumbled over the top. I had a very sad moment at the end when I realised I’d probably never eat here again. We both agreed it was one of the top five meals we’d had on this trip.

In the morning we started with a morning walk through St Columb’s park. It was a nice big green space with just one creepy statue.

There were Columb-related statues and other things to look at in the park.

After a walk through town we went to the Free Derry Museum. Before entering I knew very little about Bloody Sunday but the museum was extremely informative and had artifacts from the day, footage and recordings.

If you go take a box of tissues, it’s tragic on so many levels and really makes you sympathise with the people of Derry.

On our way to the station we bought some fancy biscuits from this very instagramable shop then forgot to eat them.

We saw some fancy cars on the way.

Back over the Peace Bridge and to the station.

On the way home we got off the train at Castlerock, a little seaside town. We had a slightly underwhelming lunch at a local bar but the staff were very friendly.

Not as friendly as local character Ronnie, who wandered over as we finished eating and told us about basking sharks, how he had dropped his cornflakes on the floor that morning, and swimming in Greece. Having an extremely thick accent meant he was quite hard to understand but we concentrated very hard and seemed to make all the right noises.

We had a nice walk along the beach in the warm, windy weather and stopped to take a few photos before heading back to the station.

The trip back to Belfast was largely uneventful apart from the train running a bit late.

The weekend just gone has been very busy so this has been my most delayed post of the trip! We’ve done a few things over the weekend so I’ll to to finish everything off before leaving London. Only a couple of sleeps until we are home!