It is a small area of land and yet the nine counties of Ireland’s north hold within them a bewildering variety of riches and rewards. It is a complex region of proud and busy cities, of long, empty beaches, of formidable glens and rich farmland, of towering cliffs and yielding hills. This is the land that St Patrick walked and Heaney celebrated. Ireland’s Beautiful North is an introduction to Ulster, featuring a selection of thesights and places that go to make this province a place of such constantfascination, from the awesome geology of the Giant’s Causeway to the waves that break on the soft sands of the Atlantic seaboard, from the murals of Belfast to the churches of Armagh and the ancient remains of Navan Fort, from the Fermanagh and Cavan lakelands to the Glens of Antrim and the Mourne Mountains.