We are home now after an almost three week trip to Czech Republic, France, Northern Ireland and Scotland.
Regarding Northern Ireland, there were a few surprises. Our itinerary was to land at Dublin, rent a car and drive to Belfast for a night. The evening was a black cab tour, a night at the Premiere Inn, and in the morning a reduced fare trip through the Titanic Belfast. We were then to go to Portballintrae for a Bushmills tour, an evening at the Bayview Hotel, then on to Ardara for a night and back to Dublin for our departure.
CAR RENTAL. I rented a car using my Visa credit card which said they would cover insurance, so do not buy any. The rental counter person said I needed a letter showing the credit card covered insurance. Without it, either buy insurance or no rental. I had no letter and had a trip planned so you can guess what I did. The insurance cost almost equaled the rental cost. Not a good start! I drove to Belfast ( on the "wrong"side of the road, from the "wrong" side of the car, shifting with the "wrong" hand, and entered round abouts clockwise. Very exciting till I got the hang of it. Then, not so bad. The roads were very good.
BELFAST. My personal view of the hotel was it was a night's flop with a good breakfast. Uncomfortable bed and pillows. Very basic for a basic price, but again, good breakfast. The Black Cab tour was very good. Fine, friendly , knowledgeable and chatty driver. A good value. Went to a restaurant highly recommended on this forum for the seafood chowder. AAHHH, not a fan. Next day went to what my mind called the "Titanic Museum". A museum it is not, since it has nothing from the Titanic. Nonetheless, an interesting few hours. We bought early bird tickets. We saved $$ and more importantly we had the place pretty much to ourselves. As we were finishing, the crowds arrived. We then left Belfast and drove to Portballintrae. We were staying at the Bayview Hotel.
Words cannot describe our opinion of the Bayview Hotel. Beautiful view, clean, nice premises, spacious clean rooms with comfortable beds and pillows. Their staff were all top notch. We had dinner there and it was wonderful! I started with fish chowder that made the chowder from the Belfast location taste like sewer remains. We toured Bushmills, which is very close, and enjoyed that. At the end of the tour was the wee taste. I had my first ever hot toddy. Marvelous!! I bought a bottle of their "squeezins" and the toddy mix. This Christmas will be delicious!
We returned to the Bayview for the night. The next day I arranged for my adult daughter who is a very accomplished rider, to take a five hour horse ride along the ocean. I drove her to The stable where she was greeted and asked to come into the owner's home for tea and scones. Afterwards she was evaluated for her riding skills and found to be very well suited for the ride. This was with . Taste of the North Coast. My daughter owns several horses and has been jumping in competition for fifteen years. She said this was the best ride she had ever been on. Very high praise from her. While she did that, the rest of us went to the Giant's Causeway. Very nice. We did not pay for the Causeway experience and parked a half mile away for 8 pounds and got free entrance to the causeway. We walked down but paid the pound for the uphill ride back. It turned out that my daughter also went there but on horseback.
After the ride the family got together and decided that we did not want to leave the Bayview Hotel, so we stayed another night. On this trip we stayed in three star hotels in France which were very nice. We all agreed that we liked the Bayview more. The next morning it was a drive back to Dublin and a night at their Premiers Inn. We had the same opinion of that place as the one in Blefast.
Anyway, that is all I can say. I hope someone gets something out of our experience.