Qualla: Portavogie https://qualla.com/portavogie en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:16 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/j/portavogie-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Portavogie https://qualla.com/portavogie Portavogie: Introduction https://qualla.com/portavogie/ Photo credit Erl Johnston, CC BY-SA 4.0. Most evenings around the same hour, a small crowd gathers on the quay at Portavogie. The boats are coming back, and there's a fish auction about to start. This is the easternmost settlement in Ireland - a strip of houses and a working harbour pressed against the Irish Sea on the seaward side of the Ards Peninsula. The village has roughly 2,100 residents, eighteen old family names that recur down the centuries, and a fleet of prawn boats that has somehow survived the long contraction of European inshore fishing. Three murals on the side of the primary school tell the whole story of how this place came to be: by sea, for the sea, because of the sea.

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Image: Erl Johnston | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/j/portavogie-wp/gcsj-portavogie-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Portavogie: From Stable Hole to Modern Quay https://qualla.com/portavogie/ Photo credit Albert Bridge, CC BY-SA 2.0. The first settlers came in around 1555 to a spot called Stable Hole, at the bottom of what is now Warnocks Road. The site was chosen for the same reason every other fishing hamlet on this coast was chosen: rocks for shelter, a sandy shore where boats could be drawn up beyond the ...

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Image: Albert Bridge | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/j/portavogie-wp/gcsj-portavogie-from-stable-hole-to-modern-quay.mp3 0:06 2 full Portavogie: Little Holland on the Irish Sea https://qualla.com/portavogie/ Photo credit Michal Osmenda from Brussels, Belgium, CC BY-SA 2.0. Looking inland from the village, the past becomes visible in a different way. The route north to Newtownards was historically flood-prone at spring tide, and the western boundary of Portavogie was simply called 'the Bogs.' To drain land and grind grain, residents of the Ards Peni...

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Image: Michal Osmenda from Brussels, Belgium | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/j/portavogie-wp/gcsj-portavogie-little-holland-on-the-irish-sea.mp3 0:06 3 full Portavogie: Eighteen Names, One Industry https://qualla.com/portavogie/ Photo credit Oliver Dixon, CC BY-SA 2.0. In 1900 the village register listed eighteen family names: Adair, Pyper, Warnock, Boyd, Rutherford, Lawson, Ambrose, Thompson, McKee, Clint, Hughes, Cully, Edmund, Palmer, Young, McVea, McClements, and Coffey. Most of these lines have continued unbroken to the present day - read ...

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Image: Oliver Dixon | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/j/portavogie-wp/gcsj-portavogie-eighteen-names-one-industry.mp3 0:06 4 full Portavogie: The Troubles, the Cost https://qualla.com/portavogie/ Photo credit Oliver Dixon, CC BY-SA 2.0. Two men died near Portavogie during the Troubles, both shot, both on dates in early April two decades apart. David McQueen, a 28-year-old Protestant civilian, was shot at the side of the road in April 1973 by an unidentified loyalist gunman. William Killen, 36, was killed in his ...

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Image: Oliver Dixon | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/j/portavogie-wp/gcsj-portavogie-the-troubles-the-cost.mp3 0:06 5 full Portavogie: Game Days and the George Best Trophy https://qualla.com/portavogie/ Photo credit Minacaboverde, CC BY-SA 4.0. Sport keeps the village together when the boats are quiet. Portavogie Rangers FC hosts an annual football tournament called the George Best Trophy in memory of the Manchester United and Northern Ireland striker, an icon born just down the coast in Belfast. A five-a-side tournamen...

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Image: Minacaboverde | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/s/j/portavogie-wp/gcsj-portavogie-game-days-and-the-george-best-trophy.mp3 0:06 6 full