Armoy

Racing at Robbo's Corner

Robbo's Corner is a bend on the public road through Armoy, named for rider Mervyn Robinson. On race weekend, the 3.03-mile circuit takes motorcycles anti-clockwise past Church Bends, Dunlop's Leap and Kennedy's Corner, on the same Hillside, Glenshesk and Lagge roads where the Armoy Armada tested their bikes in the late 1970s.

The Armada, at 167 Hillside Road directly opposite Robbo's Corner, is a bar, restaurant and six-room B&B, with a dining room that seats up to sixty-five. The kitchen runs to a pepper chicken stack with champ and onion rings, chicken Maryland with bacon, pineapple and a banana fritter, seafood chowder, a goat's-cheese tart and a rump-steak ciabatta, with fish and chips for anyone who wants it plain.

Pubs beyond the circuit

On Main Street, the Rooks Nest is a traditional wet-led pub, with bar games and a landlady whose welcome gets mentioned about as often as the Guinness.

A little outside the village on Fivey Road, the Scenic Inn is family-run, with live music at weekends. At the 2017 Licensed & Catering News Awards it won Community Bar of the Year and Pub Food of the Year; coverage that year reported more than £95,000 raised for charity in the previous three years. The menu includes sizzling pepper chicken, a chicken stack with champ and pepper sauce, BBQ-brisket nachos, a taco trio, chicken-and-chorizo penne and sticky-toffee pudding.

Farm preserves and early church stone

For provisions, Ballykenver Farmshop sits on Amanda Hanna's dairy farm, worked for two hundred years and grazing 180 grass-fed cows. She makes jams, chutneys, curds, sauces and puddings in small batches, and the shelves carry local cheese, bread, produce and honey. The business started as "Jam at the Doorstep," when she sold jars from a box at her back door; you can now book in to make your own jam, chutney or lemon curd.

St Patrick's Church of Ireland stands on a site that tradition links to Bishop Olcan, placed here by St Patrick. The present basalt church is largely nineteenth-century, built in 1820 and 1846, but beside it is the medieval round tower: roofless sandstone, ten and a half metres of it, with no windows and a single tall, narrow, round-headed doorway. A salmon-shaped weathervane refers to the fishing on the River Bush, and the east window, Faith, Hope and Charity, is by Henry Holiday.

River paths and onward journeys

The Bush runs through the village, and Armoy Riverside Park gives you flat, off-road paths beside it, with a picnic area and a play park. The playground on Church Road was rebuilt in 2023 with accessible equipment, including a ground-level trampoline and a roundabout. For something longer, the Breen Forest Trail is a five-and-a-half-mile circuit from the Altarichard car park that climbs Croaghan. The former Ballycastle Railway ran seventeen miles and closed in 1950.

Armoy sits among rolling hills with Knocklayd rising to the north, on the A44 between Ballymoney and Ballycastle. The nearest train is at Ballymoney, about eight miles away on the Belfast–Derry line, and Ulsterbus 178 stops at the Diamond. The Dark Hedges are close by, an avenue of beeches the Stuart family planted around 1775 to impress anyone arriving at Gracehill House. Ballycastle and its harbour are five or so miles off, and the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge, first strung up by salmon fishermen in 1755, is along the coast at Ballintoy.

The Armada in stone

The Armoy Armada Monument remembers Mervyn Robinson, Joey Dunlop, Frank Kennedy and Jim Dunlop, who raced together for only three seasons. Frank, known as Big Frank, stood over six feet and once rode pillion with two broken legs. Jim Dunlop unveiled the motorcycle-shaped stone sculpture.