while packing our stuff and preparing for checkout on the morning of day 04, we spotted a cute cat[001] in front of our window. later we found out it was the b&b owner's cat, and it is rather rare that someone gets to spot the cat. tim, that was the owner's name, also told us that lots of people from the uk are here for halloween and holidays, including school kids, since they seem to have holidays now. again we did not know that halloween was such a big thing over here. our first stop for today was the carrick-a-rede rope bridge[002-038], a rope bridge that was initially built by fishermen to get easier to their boats for salmon fishing. then later it was for tourists and fishermen alike, and finally it was another location for game of thrones. and actually the bridge looks way longer in the actual scene than in real - it is the scene where balon greyjoy gets killed. also the island itself was way more an attraction than the rope bridge. really beautiful, but unfortunately full of people - a thing we were not used to over the last few days. luckily the sun came out for a few minutes, and this gave a wonderful boost to all the colours of the sea, the stones, the flora, and the sky; just amazing. after a short car ride we arrived at the ballintoy harbour[039-129]. seems also this place was taken for shootings of game of thrones scenes, namely the greyjoy's iron islands. there was even an ongoing GoT tour[039] with loads of real-life greyjoys. i wonder, why there is no tour for fans of ramsay bolton - so much cooler than any greyjoy ever will be. we did not go to the exact place where the shooting for GoT took place, and instead we walked in the opposite direction, away from the car park. and after a few minutes of walk, we were totally alone again. the walk along the coastline was really amazing, again lots of vibrant colours - even without direct sunlight. the place looked like it was autumn, all earth-coloured, endless shades of brown, lush green and dried out blades of grass - really an amazing colour palette. walking further along the seashore we came to the elephant rock[060,​063,​066-067,​074,​076-077]. and from the right angle, it really looked like a huge mammoth or elephant. we also found the stone arcs right next to it pretty impressive. while we wanted to walk to white park bay[094], it turned out we could not walk on since the flood blocked our way along the coast. but it was wonderful so far, so it was okay, to just walk back again. seems like another spare-time activity is to jump from rocks[114] in neoprene suits, and it looked like these guys really had fun. we spotted a lot of birds there[105-106,​108-113,​117-118,​120], even rabbits[121-122], and a seal[126]. the spotting of the latter made us very happy, since we really love these creatures very much. back at the car we had a little snack and rest, and then drove on to dunseverick castle[130-132], which - you might have already guessed it - was ... of course ... another game of thrones location. again we were pretty surprised what irish call a "castle", when it was in fact not more than the ruins of a ruined ruin. but well, why not - simply just enjoy and behold the beauty and magnificence of the impressive castle of dunseverick[132]. last stop for today was the giant's causeway[133-180], an area with hexagonal basalt columns, leading from the cliff foot to under the sea. almost all the stones are black, and if they are wet, it makes them even darker. they combined halloween here with the mexican day of the dead[134,137], so there are these little decorated skulls all over the way down from the visitor centre to the shoreline. there were a lot of people - at least compared to what we were used to earlier this day. but after all, the giant's causeway seems to be among the most famous tourist attractions of northern ireland. so this was to be expected. it was already late, the sun set, and thus it was getting darker with every minute. so we soon walked back to the car, as we will return here tomorrow anyway. back in portrush we went to our room in an uladh, tossed our camera gear, and went to grab some food from a take away. today's temperature was around 11°C and it was again cloudy all day long. track for day 04.