portballintrae10

 

The road at the top right of the photograph leads to Bushmills - at the junction you can still see the old Bayview Hotel and WatchHouse  Cottage before it was demolished and replaced by a larger apartment block. On the left side you can see one of the two distinct concentric rings of Lissanduff which dates to the Bronze Age - the site is still to be excavated.

 

Theories suggest the concentric circles were used for water retention and rituals - the elevated site (not visible in the picture) was certainly used as a fort during periods of its history. The small harbour is where the 12,000 artifacts from the Girona came ashore, the Belgian marine archeologist Robert Stenuit found and excavated this Spanish Armada shipwreck in 1967/68 after it had lain untouched for 380 years.