I wrote this on Saturday afternoon, intending to post it via my phone, but the batteries died, and I never got around to it.

God, I needed this, after the stress and the strain of the last week. If I could, I’d bring all my friends here. I’m sitting here, at a picnic table, looking out over the sea toward Rathlin, wind blowing cold and hard, but the sun shining, glinting off the foam as the waves crash over the rocks. Dramatic might begin to come close, I suppose.

I’m sipping a pretty rotten coffee, now, but I was round the Bushmills distillery earlier, trying some very fine malts, including the one only available at the distillery, the 12-year-old, which is very fine and smooth. Good for the soul.

It’s a little slice of Iceland, this, part of the same basalt plain that’s out there across the sea, the same expanse of hard black rock. It’s a bit better covered wih soil, and much greener, but the same basalt. More mythically, it’s part of the Scotish folk-kingdom of Dalrida, and the geography here is certainly something you could mistake for Scotland – the winding road through the Antrim glens is beautiful, and I’ve not seen a coastline to come close anywhere on the planet.

It’s nothing short of wonderful, after the horrors of the last week, to come somewhere like this, where it’s just impossible to be down at all. I said earlier in the week that it was hard to see the wonder and the light. Not here it isn’t. Like I said: if I could bring you all here, I would. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m done with my coffee, and I think I’m going to take a walk along the shore…