Episode 3 The Gaitherin

Would you look at all this? We're on the north coast

in Portballintrae and we are on our holidays!

THEY CHEER

And on today's show, Paula McIntyre goes onto the beach.

-I'm not going to do that in case it's at dog leg height.

-Oh, thanks(!)

I get a bit of a surprise.

I have another little secret...

-but you'll have to come with me.

-Intriguing.

Oh, and we get a bit mucky.

All that AND ice cream.

Mm...

-Welcome to The Gaitherin!

-THEY CHEER

MUSIC: "The Gaitherin Theme" by De Wolfe

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

STONEWALL PLAY CEILIDH MUSIC

Welcome to the lovely seaside resort of Portballintrae

and to the Bayview Hotel. Could we give a big thanks to Stonewall?

What a great performance to start us off.

And a lovely start from our dancers.

These are the Walled City Tattoo Highland dancers. Great footwork.

Now, on the show we have pink fish and chips,

we have a wee toddy and we have buried treasure,

buried in jam jars under the bed.

Now if you want to find out about maritime history,

here is the man, Chris McCaughan.

We'll come to those jam jars in a wee minute.

But there's something to do with a U-boat and this lovely bay.

Oh, yes.

World War I, a German U-boat arrived here in the middle of the bay.

There was a tramp steamer, a British armed steamer

in here called the Wheatear.

And they both exchanged fire.

So the German submarine, it fired at it and one of the missiles

went missing up past and right into the village here and killed a cow.

Now in more peaceful times,

-there was trade between here and Scotland.

-Oh, yes.

Yes, there was trade. There was cattle, sheep, cows, donkeys.

Anything. Whiskey.

Anything at all that could be moved by boat

was brought back and forward.

And, of course, not only was there trade but there was

quite a bit of smuggling going on and, you know, these things happen.

Well, that story I mentioned about the buried treasure,

we'll come back to that one, Chris,

because it was buried in jam jars under the bed.

But mostly when people are dealing with treasure,

isn't it, it's under the ground somewhere?

So we sent Ralph McLean on his first-ever archaeological dig

to Monea Castle in County Fermanagh.

Wow. Nick, this is some place. A very grand residence indeed.

Tell me about it.

Well, it's one of the finest Plantation castles in the county.

It's three storeys. It's built of local stone.

The ground floor here,

a stone vault covering it.

So, very dark and very gloomy.

The higher you go up, the more you're getting into private quarters -

big windows, wooden floors,

-upstairs toilet.

-Now, that's progress, isn't it?

Yeah, all mod cons.

It's all tied in to an uneasy balance between comfort and defence.

-And you're going to put all of this together in a book.

-Yes.

We're trying to reconstruct the book in the same way

as the surveyors mapped Ulster in the 17th century.

So you'll be able to directly compare and contrast

what they saw and what you can see today.

We're going to add that to site visits of all of the known

archaeological sites of the time

and combine that with the excavation results,

and produce, effectively,

21st-century mapping of the 17th-century states.

-It's corbelling.

-Corbelling?

-Yes.

-This is part of the bigger project, isn't it?

-It is, yes.

This is part of a three-year project

that's funded by the Ulster-Scots Academy.

The point of it is to raise awareness of

the Ulster-Scots culture.

We know a lot about the castle and who built it

but only a certain amount about the ordinary people.

So what we're trying to do is dig around the castle to see

if we can find some evidence of that.

-What have you found so far?

-This is a musket ball. Just feel it.

-It's heavy.

-That's some weight, that. I wouldn't want to be hit by that.

-No, you would not.

When you look around the castle,

there's lots of musket loops - wee holes in the walls.

They are there to protect the castle.

So they would have been fired through the muskets by the soldiers in the castle.

The other wee piece I'll show you is a clay pipe.

It's not the biggest thing in the world. Not the biggest pipe.

It's not, no. You can date these pipes by their size,

because tobacco came in at the end of the 16th century,

and when it came in, it was rare and expensive.

So the pipes were smaller.

People building the castle could've been smoking a pipe and it ended up on the ground and we found it.

This is a workman perhaps having a wee sneaky puff.

-Taking a break.

-Yeah.

-A wee puff before he got back to work.

And he threw it away and we found it. You found it.

-All those centuries later.

-400 years later.

Isn't that amazing?

Well, here we are then. So this is essentially a 17th-century toilet.

-Is that what you're telling me?

-That's right.

In the wall here is the latrine chute. So...

everything came out here into this area.

-Can I join you?

-Yes, of course.

-Excellent.

Hopefully being here will make us all find a penny,

never mind spending one.

Get digging, guys.

Christina O'Regan, you were supervising the dig at the castle.

-I was.

-So very exciting. What else has been found?

Well, aside from the lovely musket balls and the clay pipe that

you saw on the video, we also found

some little bits of a roof tile.

Now it is actually part of a ridge tile along the roof of the castle.

So this would have been along a v-shaped ridge tile

which would have been painted apple green.

And this would have acted like a little sort of ridge

right along the top - a bit like that.

So it would have made a very lovely silhouette on the castle.

Just finding these things is wonderful.

The dig's finished now but you must be itching to have other

digs across the country to discover pieces of Ulster-Scots history.

Well, this is it. I mean, we've had three excavations over three years

but that's just a fraction of the amount of

Ulster-Scots archaeology that's just on our doorstep.

Listen, all the very best with other digs, Christina,

and thanks very much for joining us.

Now, when the Ulster-Scots settlers came here, land was very important.

But not just always the prime land.

And, Liam Logan, tell us

a bit about how the bogland

featured in the life of settlers here.

Well, for Scottish people coming over here,

they would find the bog very familiar.

We would call it a moss now, Helen.

And if you try to think of it as a picnic with work at it.

We had words, Ulster-Scots words, for cutting the peat. Give us a few.

Well, you would've cut into the breast to the bank.

Up towards the top, that would've been called flaugh peats.

-Flaugh peats?

-Yeah, they were pretty loose.

And really not much use for burning.

When you went down the bank a wee bit more, you got the dark,

dense peat that you cut out and then you dried.

Then hopefully in the wintertime,

that would make your bread and it would heat your house.

-It was used for making whiskey too, Helen.

-I bet it was.

Actually, there is quite a lot of fun to be had in the bog.

Just wait till you see this.

SHE SHIVERS AND SQUEALS

Are you ready?

Today, we had our bog snorkelling

which is part of International Bog Day.

It's a way of getting people out into the park.

It's good craic and it

literally gets people into the bog.

WHISTLE BLOWS

It's not bad actually. It's warm. Or warmer than I thought anyway.

Um, dirty.

We heard about bog snorkelling. I'm not quite sure what that was.

We looked it up. We had been planning to come to Northern Ireland

and so we made sure that it worked with our itinerary.

-Down.

-Down?

I did my best to represent our country but I'm afraid...

I'm afraid America will not be medalling today.

John, thank you very much for coming along. Congratulations.

I've been competing in bog snorkelling for the last ten years.

I've competed in the World Championships a couple of times.

Very pleased to have been able to come away with the win today.

I'm currently ranked third in the world.

It's such an unusual sport, you know,

it's just one of the things you've got to do before you die.

Put it on your bucket list.

We all love to be beside the seaside, don't we?

Fresh air, the waves, fish and chips, ice cream.

And there's a bit of a bonus here

because just a mile down the road is the Bushmills distillery.

Now it's a massive Irish brand but there's a bit of a story

behind that. And, Colum Egan,

you are the master distiller at Bushmills.

Yeah. So it's amazing history.

It dates all the way back to 1608, when a Scot, Sir Thomas Phillips,

actually got his first licence to distil whiskey in this area.

Why is it such a good whiskey here?

What's the story behind that?

The reason that the distillery

was sited in that location was the water.

The water flows over the same basalt rock that you get

at the Giant's Causeway so it gives it a certain mineral

composition and great taste, and a perfect way to make whiskey.

Lovely to meet you. All the best.

Right, now, the other incredible thing about this place

is that it is renowned for serving pink fish and chips.

It's just something that happened at the launch of the Giro d'Italia.

I just happened to say, "I must do some pink batter."

-Let's see pink fish and chips then.

-There we go.

-Oh, my goodness.

-There's your pink fish and chips.

-Look at that.

Looking at that, what I need now is a bit of dessert

and, oh, by Jove, you can't go wrong by having an ice cream.

And, Arnaldo Morelli, lovely to have you with us.

A well-known name in ice cream. But what's the story briefly?

Well, my great-uncle was one of nine brothers who,

in the early 1900s, walked from Italy.

My great-uncle Peter

-went to Greenock and then he crossed the Irish Sea.

-Are we talking about

-Ulster-Scots ice cream here?

-You are talking ice cream, yeah.

-I think that's where our roots are.

-Wonderful.

Now, we've got another ice-cream man with us.

Let me go over here. This is Keith. Hello, Keith. Welcome.

-How are you?

-Now, what's your family story in ice cream?

Well, our family started with our

mobile ice-cream emporium almost 40 years ago,

delivering happiness along the north coast.

Well, I can't stand here without asking, could I have an ice cream, please?

Absolutely. Of course you can.

Now, you know, sometimes the cone in Ulster-Scots is called a poke.

That's exactly right.

And I think that's because of the original shape of the cone.

-So, we will...

-Oh, my goodness!

-..give you a little ice cream.

And the only thing to make ice cream better is chocolate.

-There we go.

-Oh, Keith, that's magnificent. Thank you very much.

-No problem.

-Well, I think as I tuck...

Mm.

I'll tuck into my ice cream

and you can all listen to the wonderful Stonewall.

# The moment that I met you I was caught up in a daze

# You smiled at me politely and you shook my hand with grace

# A sense of jubilation that was written on your face

# Is burning with a passion and my heart went up in flames

# For all the time I've wasted, the places that I've been

# I've never felt much closer to the place I want to be

# Somehow things feel different when I'm looking in your eyes

# There's nothing more I want than you tonight

# For all the scars of history and heartache that I've felt

# It's never stopped me gambling with every hand I'm dealt

# Something makes me long to feel the warmth of your embrace

# The sting of your sweet honey is the bee I long to taste

# For all the time I've wasted, the places that I've been

# I've never felt much closer to the place I wanna be

# Somehow things feel different when I'm looking in your eyes

# There's nothing more I want than you tonight

# For all the time I've wasted, the places that I've been

# I've never felt much closer to the place I wanna be

# Somehow things feel different when I'm looking in your eyes

# There's nothing more I want than you tonight

# There's nothing more I want than you tonight

# There's nothing more I want than you tonight. #

WHOOPING AND APPLAUSE

That was fantastic. Absolutely. What a brilliant sound.

And I noticed... Well, Ken, you were on the tin whistle.

It's a strong instrument in your band.

Yeah, absolutely. A very popular instrument.

I think in this part of the world in general,

whether it's whistles or flutes, there's just loads of players.

And, of course, they're very easy to play. You really should try it.

-I've got a spare one here.

-Are you challenging me to...

-to learn the whistle?

-I mean, really we should give it a go, you know.

Let's give it a go.

When you're playing, if you just do a wee "tuh-tuh-tuh",

and that separates your notes, OK? So try that.

-LOUD NOTE

-Oh! Sorry!

That's a wee bit more flute band style.

-We'll take it down. It's perfect.

-All right.

Now, the thing is, I'll have to go and practise, all right?

So, a little earlier, I went to visit a man who lives down the road.

He's called David Traill

and he has a really interesting Ulster-Scots heritage.

-David.

-Good morning!

-Hello.

-Nice to see you. Come on in.

-Thank you. Thank you.

I think, probably, the place to really start in here

is with the Reverend Robert Traill,

who was born in 1603, and his claim to fame

is that he was done for treason twice.

I do notice of these three portraits, they're wearing

clerical collars and, as you look around the room,

there are quite a few others have the same. That's part of the Traill

-Ulster-Scottish story?

-Partially.

You were either in the Church or in the Army, or both.

The main portrait here, though,

is this great big one behind the sideboard.

That's the Provost Anthony Traill.

He was Provost at Trinity up until 1914, when he died,

and actually died in situ, but he and his brother, basically,

they have another little secret, but you'll have to come with me.

Intriguing.

This is the Causeway Tramway which was invented by

my Great-Uncle Willie and the Provost.

Its claim to fame is that it's the first ever

hydroelectric-driven tramway in the world.

How did it work?

In the day of the mills you had a fall of water, enough to basically

drive a generator at the bottom of the tube.

That generator then produced the electricity which

went into the rail, which ran from Portrush

all the way to the Giant's Causeway via Bushmills.

Now, in the very beginning, that rail was about

two-and-a-half feet off the ground.

What they did there must be put in poles along the whole of the way

and put in the cables so that it was overhead.

I think the best way is if we go and actually travel on the train

and you'll get at least an idea of what was going on between here

and Portrush.

What do you think it did for the area, this construction of a

hydroelectric powered train, which I just can't get over the thought of?

The hydroelectric tramway is such what was really important was

it actually brought something to the north coast which even then

was an economic black spot within the whole of Ireland.

Well David, thank you very much.

What a lovely pleasure it is just to trundle through the landscape

here with glimpses of the sea, and it's just great.

Two, one, two, four,

five, six.

Four, four, five, three, three.

Four, two, two.

Do you know something? You've got it. You've got it.

I think we'll just go for it.

So, ladies and gentlemen, it gives me enormous pleasure to introduce

Stonewall Folk Band with their newest member, tin whistler Helen Mark!

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

THEY PLAY TRADITIONAL MUSIC

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

I honestly don't think I'm going to get very many bookings from that,

but anyway, Kenny, thank you very much, and to Stonewall as well.

Now I think it's time we found out a little

bit about the Ulster-Scots history of this part of the world,

and there is no better man than Dr Bob Curran.

So, Ulster-Scots here, give me the lowdown.

A number of families have lived along this coast, Helen.

In the seventh century, the O'Flynns,

who built Dunluce fortress there.

After them came the Savages. And if you look out across the bay,

there was a castle there by Sir Henry Savage.

Brought distilling to this area.

Then they were the tenant knights of the McQuillans of Dunluce, who had

taken over the castle, and latterly, the McDonnells, the Scots arrived,

in the beginning of the 15th century.

And what it a war situation?

Did they come to dominate the land or...?

-No, they came here for marriage.

-Oh, well.

They were called wild, wicked, heilan men and they were unbiddable.

-It is all different now, Helen!

-So many stories and legends circulate.

Now, Bob, you do have a special legend for us

that you're going to tell us.

-The floor is yours, Dr Bob.

-They talk about St Patrick,

and you know that one of the things St Patrick did was

he cast the snakes out of Ireland. Well, can I tell you something?

He didn't pass them all out.

Because there was said to be one lived about Ballintoy.

I hope there's nobody here from Ballintoy.

It was driven into the sea by a holy man.

One thing is, and I don't want to terrify people,

the snake is still there!

It's driven into the sea, and if you see all those weird

currents around Ballintoy, you'll know that this snake is still there.

Now, it can be defeated.

It can be defeated by a man whose name is McCurdy.

And who has married a woman called McCurdy.

He has to dress himself in a hide from a cow which has never

sucked milk.

And he has to carry with him

a club into which three nails have been driven which have

never shod a horse, and only then - he can't kill it -

he can suspend it, and it's suspended for 100 years. And I have

to tell you that the last person to defeat it was John McCurdy in 1914.

So if you go swimming off Ballintoy, don't say I didn't warn you!

Thank you very much.

What a great story.

Since we are at the seaside, we were wondering if it was possible

to pick up food on the beach and then cook it in a caravan.

We sent Paula McIntyre to find out.

This one here isn't exactly appetising looking. Is it?

It doesn't look great, but actually, if you pull it off like that,

it's probably a bit more recognisable.

That would be nori or something.

So you roll your sushi in that?

Or laver bread. That would make sushi, yes.

-From a rock in Ballycastle to the sushi bar of Tokyo, really?

-Exactly.

No, it is... This is one of the tastier ones.

-I'm not going to do that, in case it's dog leg height.

-Oh, thanks(!)

So, Charlie, where's the best place to scavenge for seaweed?

Your best bet is in the rock pools, where it's fresh and still growing.

It needs to be like when you are picking lettuce out of your

garden or herbs, just a wee bit of a tug to ensure they're alive, yeah?

Exactly. Here we are.

-Right, I've found you some pepper dulse here.

-Oh, good.

This is probably the biggest it ever gets.

This will be nice with the lobster, then, wouldn't it?

We call it the truffles of the sea. It really is the best.

-That's a nice, young bit.

-That the pepper dulse?

-Very good.

-Because it is beautiful.

-That's about the biggest it ever gets.

-Really?

-A couple of inches.

-Nothing any more.

-So that's like finding a half pound truffle.

-I wish!

First thing to do is bring a big pot of boiling water,

add the lobster and put a lid on it. Leave it for about five minutes.

Meanwhile, finely chop your shallots. Finely chop herbs, soft herbs.

I use basil and dill. Finely chop the seaweeds.

So when the lobster is cooked, remove the claws and then remove the tail.

Given that a wee wash. And then chop that up.

In a nice frying pan, saute the shallots and butter,

really until they are nice and golden.

At that stage, I added what I call bourtree bush vinegar.

Bourtree bush is the old Ulster-Scots

name for an elderflower bush.

At this stage, put in the lobster.

And then add the herbs and the seaweed.

And that's it.

Just serve it up.

Beautiful.

-Oh, wow.

-Right, Charlie, here is the finished product.

-It smells delicious.

-Yes, it's good, isn't it?

We've got the lobster and we've got your... The dulse

and the sea lettuce. But isn't it great that that was all picked...

We were looking out the window here and it's all come from that sea.

-Yeah.

-Isn't that great? Apart from the butter.

-You don't want any of that leafy stuff there.

-I'll have that bit.

-OK, Charlie?

-Wow.

-Mm.

-That is amazing.

-Can I have some more?

-Absolutely.

Didn't that food she was cooking look absolutely delicious?

I had some of the sea lettuce she was using,

so which you like to try some? OK? Yourself? What do you think of it?

-It's rotten.

-There's an honest man! What about you?

-Go on, take a wee bit. See what it's like.

-Mm.

-What does it taste of?

-Not too bad. Yeah.

-It wouldn't be too bad with potato chips.

That's a good idea. You look really nice together, you two.

-Well, we're getting married next year, so...

-Aw, are you just engaged?

-Just engaged, yes.

-Oh, congratulations, how lovely!

Here. You can munch on that.

Now, we still have to hear about this buried treasure under

the bed in jam jars. Chris is our man.

OK, now, what is the story, Chris?

Now, this was the Girona boat went down with millions

-and millions of pounds worth of gold doubloons.

-From the Spanish Armada?

Spanish Armada, and 1,300 men lost their lives.

We didn't know anything about it but 1967,

these Belgian drivers showed up just in 30 foot of water

went in and found these gold coins

and necklaces and brought all this stuff up.

And I was speaking the lady who owns the guesthouse

and she said she had to lend these people the jam jars,

and they took the jam jars

and they filled the jams jars up with gold, you know, to keep

it nice and fresh and stuff. And of course,

you have to hide the gold, the jam jars below the bed

like the way we keep our money into boxes, you know?

So all I can tell you, if anybody is staying on the north coast,

please check under your bed because often the jam jars weren't found.

Thank you, Chris. Time for one more piece of music from Stonewall.

This is You Couldn't Have Come At A Better Time.

# What is this place we've come to?

# We don't know what to say

# We long to see each other

# But we're frightened of the day

# You met me in a barren place

# You walked me to the hill

# We were so good for each other then

# I know we could be still... #

Well, that is all we have time for.

We had a great time here in Portballintrae.

A big thank you to everyone.

Now next time we will be following our young pipers

because they are heading off to the World Piping Band Championships.

I'm a bit nervous for them. I hope they do all right.

We'll have to wait until next time to find out,

but from all of us here, bye-bye.

# ..You couldn't have come at a better time

# Since we were first together

# By the next sky so blue

# We were so good for each other

# Just me and you, just me and you

# Me and you and me and you

# You couldn't have come at a better time

# You couldn't have come at a better time. #

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE