Cushendun What colour scheme would you expect to find in a bar called the Blue Room? What colour would you expect to find in a room panelled with mahogany? Wrong on both occasions, because the Blue Room has nothing notably blue about it, and its mahogany walls have, unaccountably, been painted white. The explanation for […]

20 Harbour Rd, Carnlough, Ballymena BT44 0EU [Photo: Londonderry Arms Hotel, Carnlough.] Tired of plastic bars, phoney antiquity, reproduction furniture, synthetic materials? Looking for something genuine, solid, permanent? Look no further than the Londonderry Arms Hotel in Carnlough on the Antrim Coast, an establishment built in 1848 at the time of the great famine, by […]

Ballyvessey, Newtownabbey At a superficial glance this little pub might seem like many another scattered about the province which you would think couldn’t find their way into this book, but you would be wrong in this particular case. Even today, to look at this quiet little pub, who would have thought that at the concluding […]

57 Main St, Broughshane, Ballymena BT42 4JP [Photo: The Thatch, Broughshane.] One look at The Thatch in Broughshane, and you’ll know why it’s a Grade A listed building. From its superb thatched roof down to its studded doors and old stone walls, it fairly oozes history. The building was originally a planter’s house, and today […]