The town of Buncrana lies in the far north-west of Ireland, in County Donegal: that part of the country that is on a line with Northern Ireland, yet is in the Republic.

It’s long been our intention to visit this beautiful part of the ‘Emerald Isle’. Green it certainly is, and currently living up to its rainy reputation… But hailing from Cumbria, we’re no strangers to the element that makes it so.

Water is everywhere here, and the twisty and often exposed coast road is part of Ireland’s celebrated WAW – Wild Atlantic Way, a coastal journey of over 1200 miles. We’re at the northern end of that and happily doing a lot fewer…

Our stay here is for a week, so I’ll be doing a few mainly-photographic posts. After that, we’ll be moving to County Cavan in the middle of the country to meet up with the family and help look after our 18-month old grandson for a few days.

We’ll finish up by visiting the Antrim coast and a day trip into Belfast and – hopefully, a visit to the Titanic museum.

For now, we’re enjoying the gentle style and pace of Buncrana and its coastal parks. It has some famous sons and daughters, one of whom – following a life-changing journey of survival at sea – wrote the words to the song ‘Amazing Grace’.

For now, we’ve a plan to try some of the WAW, and, the day after, take a ferry trip across Loch Swilly to Rathmullan, probably a day trip in itself.

Here’s a few photos to close out this first post from Buncrana..

And Guinnesss – my favourite beer – did I mention that every bar and cafe seems to sell its creamy pints!

©Stephen Tanham 2023

Stephen Tanham is a writer, mystical teacher and Director of the Silent Eye, a correspondence-based journey through the forest of personality to the dawn of Being.

http://www.thesilenteye.co.uk and http://www.suningemini.blog