The Gentle Touch: A Journey Through Northern Ireland’s Countryside & Craftsmanship

I’m standing in a field with border collie Charlie and a heap of sheep, and couldn’t be happier. Charlie is being put through his paces by owner Frank Devlin at his Dunfin Farm in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. And it’s a pure joy to watch their synergy as Charlie waits for Frank’s commands to stay, lie down or round up the flock.

Frank and wife Carol open their farm to visitors from April to September, showing how they work the land, shear their sheep and raise lambs. A mine of information, Frank is as passionate about his animals as he is his soil. He takes us on a tour of his rewilding project, where bog land is now attracting a host of animals and birds, including peregrine falcons and sparrowhawks, and as we walk around a cuckoo is cuckooing loudly. 

This makes Frank very happy. Cuckoos are on the UK Red List of Birds of Conservation Concern, and in Northern Ireland specifically they are designated as a priority species. They are declining mainly due to habitat loss. But here they are attracted to the land, with the peat bog acting both as a carbon sink and an excellent feeding ground. Frank’s eagle eye spots a wonderfully intact dragonfly exoskeleton and we ponder for a moment on its beauty and the millennia of wildlife and nutrients underneath our feet.

After diverse conversations about land and heritage, plus how cute Charlie and his slightly more reticent sister Meg are, we retreat to the farm’s barn for a very welcome cup of tea and homemade scones. Food and hospitality is huge in Northern Ireland, no more so than at our first accommodation stop, the hugely comfortable and welcoming Bushmills Inn. An old coaching inn, this has lots of nooks and crannies to curl up with a book, yet all the mod cons in the room. 

It’s just up the road from the Old Bushmills Distillery; dating from 1608, it is said to be the oldest licensed whiskey distillery in the world. When I visit, it’s a bit early for a tipple, so I settle for a hearty goat’s cheese toastie and chips before heading off to the Giant’s Causeway, just a five minute drive away.

This UNESCO World Heritage site is a geological wonder. Standing on some of its 40,000 basalt columns with their hexagonal tops, it’s mind blowing to think that nature and volcanic eruptions caused these perfect shapes roughly 50 to 60 million years ago. It certainly makes you think about your place in the world.

We then head off to The Boat House Gallery and Studio just a stone’s throw away. It’s a co-operative of local creatives including a ceramicist, photographer, painter and glass artist, the very talented Eleanor-Jane McCartney. We join Eleanor-Jane for a Tiffany Glass workshop where, inspired by the landscape, we make a hexagonal ornament. She is patient with us, explaining about soldering and flux, and the alchemy of glass working is wonderfully scientific and mindful. You just sit with your piece and think and tweak. I’m thrilled with my finished result; now hanging in my kitchen, I love the way the light shines through it. 

Down the Causeway Coast, there is a Causeway Craft Trail you can follow with a host of choices, as well as Northern Ireland’s Économusée network which allows you to watch rural artisans at work. We join Heather McFadden at Gobbins Crafts, her jewellery workshop in Islandmagee near Larne. From here Heather runs a range of classes, with a particular emphasis on copper, silver, and gold. A true master, she has worked on jewellery pieces for Game of Thrones. A lot of the series was filmed in Northern Ireland, with additional sets at the Titanic Studios in Belfast. 

Gobbins Cliff Path

We make silver rings and I just go into the zone. After my glasswork class, I’m a dab hand at soldering and just love my finished product of three delicate stacking rings. All the while, Heather keeps us fortified with tea and local Northern Irish speciality Fifteen, a no-bake cake made from 15 digestive biscuits, 15 marshmallows, 15 glacé cherries, condensed milk and desiccated coconut.

Propelled by a sugar rush, we head off to The Gobbins Cliff Path – ‘Gobbins’ from the Irish Gobán, meaning tip of land or headland. It’s a mega feat of engineering, winding along the dramatic coastline via walkways, bridges and tunnels. Dating back to 1901, the path was an instant hit, but by 1954 landslips and maintenance problems forced it to close. Fifty years later, Larne Borough Council injected new life and funds into the project, reopening it in 2015 with further plans to extend. Hard hats, hard shoes and a hard stomach are necessary if you are claustrophobic or afraid of heights, but it is worth it for the views and wildlife. We saw kittiwakes, guillemots and razorbills, and squealed when we saw some puffins, their orange beaks really standing out against the basalt cliffs. 

Harbourview Hotel

Harbourview Hotel

Windswept and ruddy-cheeked, we retired to our next stop, The Harbourview Hotel in the pretty village of Carnlough. Coming into the reception, we were welcomed by Paddy the wolfhound. For any Netflix fans, the lobby and some rooms may be familiar as the hotel featured heavily in the recent hit show How To Get To Heaven From Belfast. The hotel underwent a major refurbishment last year after filming took place, changing its name from The Londonderry Arms and positioning itself as Ireland’s first whiskey hotel. It certainly does what it says on the label, with a special room packed purely with Irish whiskey. There’s everything from Writer’s Tears to Method and Madness, Dingle to the more well known Jameson. The bar and cute on-site Wee Pub are equally well stocked. 

Harbourview also has its own small batch, hand-bottled whiskies: Carnlough, Limavady and Outwalker. Co-owner Adrian McLaughlin takes us on a tour of its casks. We sip an initially neat Carnlough, and I must admit I did then add water. But I found that taking my time to savour it made it all the more enjoyable. And isn’t that what travelling here is all about?

BOOK IT

Rooms at The Bushmills Inn start from £305, bushmillsinn.com

Rooms at The Harbourview Hotel start from £140 theharbourviewhotel.com 

Margaret was a guest of Tourism Ireland. For more visit Ireland.com/northernireland