RHH's photos with the keyword: county londonderry

When in Northern Ireland recently we visited the city of Londonderry and walked the old city walls. These are the part of the walls near Magazine Gate.

"Roaring Meg" is a name for a number of old historic cannon. This one is on the walls of old Londonderry and was one of twenty-four cannon presented by the city of London after the siege of 1641.

These three photos are all of the Londonderry city walls. The old city walls are complete and the city is one of the few European cities that still has its original walls. It is the only city in Ireland that has them. Many of the cannon that guarded the walls are also still there. We walked around the old city on the walls when we in Londonderry for a day. This is the part of the wall between Bishop's Gate and the Double Bastion.

One of the days we were in Northern Ireland we drove to Londonderry and walked the old city walls. Londonderry has some of the best preserved walls of any European city and they can be walked all the way around the old city. These were taken after walking the city walls and are view of the River Foyle. This photo includes the Peace Bridge, a footbridge over the Foyle.

This is a view of the River Foyle and the city of Londonderry from the promenade near the Town Hall. We had walked the old city walls and were on our way back to the car when we stopped here.

We saw hundreds of these Small Tortoiseshell butterflies when we were in Northern Ireland recently. This was one of the better photos I was able to get.

While in Northern Ireland we spent a great deal of time walking the beaches, or strands, as they are called. Northern Ireland has many fabulous beaches on the north coast, but climate and the coldness of the North Sea mean that they are not as popular as other European beaches. This is Portstewart Strand, a two-mile beach to the west of the town of Portstewart. We walked the beach to its western end at the River Bann and then back to Portstewart where we enjoyed some honeycomb ice cream.

These are the two ladies with whom I spent the last three weeks. In front is our oldest daughter, Jennifer, a renal doctor in the City Hospital in Belfast, and behind is my wife, Nancy. The photo was taken while walking the Portstewart Strand.

This is Portstewart Strand in County Londonderry in Northern Ireland near the town of Portstewart. We walked the strand from end to end one of the days we were in Northern Ireland.

This World War II Spitfire did a fly-over at Causeway Hospital in Coleraine, Northern Ireland while we were there. Wee went to the hospital grounds to see it since our daughter works for the National Health Service, though at a different hospital.

We are home again. Our daughter took us from Belfast to Dublin early Tuesday morning. We flew Aer Lingus from Dublin to Chicago O'Hare where my sister and her husband met us with our vehicle. We drove about four hours yet that evening to La Crosse, Wisconsin, where we stayed the night. Wednesday we drove from La Crosse to Billings, Montana, a fifteen hour drive. Yesterday we finished the long drive from Billings to our home arriving around noon. We were gone for nearly six weeks, flew over 7000 miles and drove another 4500 miles. It is good to be back. In Northern Ireland where we visited our daughter, we quarantined for two weeks and then spent the final week out of quarantine. Thus far we have avoided the virus, though last week we learned that my elderly parents have both been diagnosed with Covid and one of our sons also was diagnosed with it but is well again. Our handicapped son and our parents are under a total lockdown at the facilities in which they live. We have not seen our son for nearly eight months and would be unable to see our parents even if we were in Michigan where they live. The photos I've posted are from the grounds of the Causeway Hospital in Northern Ireland. We went there to see this Word War II Spitfire do a fly-over. The plane flew in from Scotland where it had flown over all the major hospitals and did the same in Northern Ireland in honor of all the National Health Service people, of whom our daughter is one, though she works not at Causway but at the City Hospital in Belfast. The second photo shows the bottom of the Spitfire and the message it carried. We were able to get some photos, though they are not the greatest.

This was the estate house of Frederick Hervey, 4th Earl of Bristol and Church of Ireland Lord Bishop of Londonderry. The estate is now managed by the National Trust and the estate house is a ruin, but still worth visiting. The estate also has on it a number of other buildings, a walled garden and the Mussenden temple, a library on the cliffs overlooking the sea (I've posted some photos of it earlier).

This is the front entrance to the Downhill estate house, now a ruin, but once the home of Frederick Hervey, Earl of Bristol and Bishop of Londonderry. The towns of Castlerock and of Portstewart and of the Portstewart strand are just visible in the background.

This was the view west from one of the windows of the now ruined Downhill estate house. The mouth of the Foyle River and County Donegal are visible in the background.

We spent yesterday at Castlerock in County Londonderry. We had been told they were going to be flying balloons on the beach and we went and watched them and also walked from Castlerock to Benone and the seven mile strand there. This was one of the balloons with County Donegal beyond.

These were two of the balloons they were flying on Castlerock beach yesterday. We had seen the event advertised and spent the day on the beach, walking to Benone and just sitting in the sunshine.

The building on the headland is Mussenden Temple, originally built as a library on the Downhill Desmesne. The view is from the beach to the west, the Downhill Strand. We visited the temple, the estate of which it is part, the ruins of the old estate house and the strand below last week.

Built in 1785, Mussenden Temple was originally a library on the estate of Frederick Hervey, 4th Earl of Bristol and Church of Ireland Lord Bishop of Londonderry. The estate is now managed by the National Trust and the estate house is a ruin, but still worth visiting.