Despite the noise from
the road, surprisingly busy considering it goes from nowhere to
nowhere, we had another undisturbed night although it rained most of
it. It being Sunday we thought that we'd have a day off so enjoyed
our usual late Sunday Breakfast while we watched most of the other
vans leave before repositioning to a slightly better pitch.
A morning, well day
really, of doing notalot, Bren catching up on some knitting and Terry
creating this blog whilst we watched the weather slowly improve. We
don't appear to be making much progress with our “tour” but up to
now we've really enjoyed our visit, not expecting the attractiveness
of Northern Ireland and friendliness of everybody we've met. We're
not too worried about the weather having come expecting it to be wet
and taking anything else as a bonus.
But something notable,
indeed famous, about Buncranna although probably little known.
Adjacent to the parking area is a small garden/park which is
dedicated to one John Newton, author of “Amazing Grace”. It seems
that this foul-mouthed aggressive sea captain fell victim to a shipwreck
caused by a sudden violent storm off the nearby coast and was adrift for three days when, by amazing
grace, the wind changed and blew the wreck into Lough Swillie, above Buncranna, and he and his fellow sailors were rescued. He became a changed
man by the experience and turned into a pious god-fearing convert who
became a priest, forming his own church, and writing the words and tune to the now world-famous
hymn.
He also converted from a slaver captain, his trade before the shipwreck, and joined forces with the anti-slave movement who after 20 years achieved abolition of the African slave trade.
He also converted from a slaver captain, his trade before the shipwreck, and joined forces with the anti-slave movement who after 20 years achieved abolition of the African slave trade.
 |
| John Newton |
No comments:
Post a Comment