Boxing with a Buddy: Holidays

Today, weather wise, was looking good. The sun was shining which was much better than those black clouds over the mountains yesterday, although I have to admit they were dramatic.

It was to be a day of sightseeing. Although we live beside the sea we can't stay away from it. Our first decision was to tour the coastline here. The sands looked really golden and were practically deserted. The sand is lined with dunes around here. The sand stretches on forever and always there is the backdrop of The Mourne Mountains.

We had heard about a lighthouse somewhere around that we would like to see, but other than that had no plan and just wandered along the coastline. In the middle of nowhere we came across these ruins of an ancient church - St. John's Church.

St John's Church

Even before this was built they think there was an older, wooden church because they found some graves half under the walls of this church where they had just built across them. I can't remember how old the church was, but apparently this is what it would have looked like when new:-

Fireball really enjoyed getting out of the car. He is not too happy when Saint's are around, but nevertheless he found a Holy Well under the wall surrounding the church. Again they had just built the wall right over it. It is a natural spring and they would be glad of the water so I suppose they thought it was Holy, but when I looked into it the water just looked stagnant to me!

Fireball sat above the Holy Well

We carried on, the road getting narrower and more rutted, when at last we came across the lighthouse at St. John's Point. This was much more Fireball's style.

The Entrance to the Lighthouse

The lighthouse was painted black and yellow. We couldn't remember seeing a lighthouse painted yellow and black before, which caused us to wonder if there was a reason behind which colours are chosen. Apparently it depends on their background, they are painted to make them stand out to Mariners. A lighthouse against fields is painted white, a lighthouse against white cliffs is painted with horizontal red and white stripes. I still didn't establish exactly why this one is yellow and black, but it certainly stood out. It looked freshly painted and had a lovely group of white coastguard cottages around it.

The lighthouse itself

We wandered around the edge, towards the sea and saw the separate fog horn and shed. I always think the foghorn noise comes from the lighthouse and am surprised when I find it has nothing to do with the actual lighthouse..