Wise’s Eye

Berkeley Wise, chief engineer of an Irish railway company, built the Gobbins path in 1902 to attract visitors to this part of Ireland. In 2015 it reopened after restoration. We took a 2 1/2 hour guided tour because that is the only way you can do it ,starting going through a hole carved in the rock called Wise’s eye. We followed a path hugging a cliff face over bridges, in tunnels under the irish sea, up and down staircases cut into the rock face and listened to lots of local stories. We didn’t notice the rain and were fascinated how this path could have been cut by hand more than 100 years ago just for tourism. We even learnt something about sea birds. Olwen, our guide, was excellent. All in all we went up and down 1200 steps and 3 miles as the sea crashed beneath us.

On our was this morning we passed through Loughgall and learned a little bit about where dad Irwin came from.