Ice-Cream, chips, play parks and promenade. All the classic ingredients of a resort town are in plentiful supply in Portstewart on the Co Derry coast. On a sunny August Sunday, the prospects look good. "Them chips smell lovely," says a bare-backed, freckled nine-year-old. Within seconds he's in the queue at the chip van on Portstewart strand. He's not the only one to succumb to the temptation. A constant stream of bodies - some confidently brown, other dangerously pink - line up at "Five Star Catering". Sunbathing is obviously hungry work.
Just over a mile away in the centre of the town, the treat is ice-cream at Morelli's, a cafe with a timeless feel and a view of the sea. If you like a good story with your banana split, a member of the Morelli clan will oblige with the tale of how grandfather Angelo Morelli arrived in Dublin from Italy just days before the 1916 Rising. His uncle already had a cafe in Coleraine, and within years Angelo was making a name for himself in Portstewart. By the time you get around to enjoying a cappuccino, you'll hear of his internment on the Isle of Man during the second World War, when being Italian wasn't flavour of the month.
Grand-daughter Nicole Morelli and her brother Damian, who now runs the business, are living proof that wars may come and go but ice-cream parlours go on forever. The children of Angelo's customers bring their children into a cafe that has changed little since the 1950s. "They don't even like it when you change the menu, because they want it just like it was when they were children," says Damian's wife Ellen. Meanwhile Angelo, after 56 years in Portstewart, is back enjoying life in his home village in the south of Italy. The long strand just outside Portstewart is probably the main attraction, while the town also boasts three golf courses. Stretching along for miles, the beach could be truly spectacular. But if you look down from one of the nearby hills, at least on a busy Sunday, what you see is a thousand or more cars - like a huge army of steel about to advance on the sea. The National Trust owns and manages the beach and charges £2.50 per car; a warden says the capacity is 2,000 or more vehicles. Small play areas are condoned off and the trust keeps the beach clean, but with cars driving just 20 metres from the water's edge, it would not be everybody's idea of a day at the sea. In consolation, there are a number of other beaches close by.
Portstewart is by any standards a very civilised sort of resort, in contrast to neighbouring Portrush with its amusement arcades, neon lights, and fast food joints. In the well-worn fairground at Portrush the soft toys on offer look more scary than cuddly, but children make the most of it, sitting in giant tea cups circling a teapot covered with flashing lights. In the way of entertainment, "Sunday Evening Singalongs" in the Methodist church looked the most promising to me.
Driving back the three-mile stretch to Portstewart, the road is lined, shanty townstyle, with mobile homes, and there's a definite change of tone. Seasoned visitors will tell you this is because Portrush was traditionally a working-class Protestant resort, while Portstewart attracted middle-class Catholics, although it is accepted the latter is now relatively mixed.
Portstewart, nestling under the imposing structure of O'Hara's castle, which at some point fell into the hands of the local convent, is more a place for families than revellers. There is just one night club in the town. Frances O'Connell, a middle-aged woman who has lived here all her life, sums it up: "There's no rowdiness or anything like that."
John and Celine McDermott have driven the 65 miles from Malin in Co Donegal to spend the day here. Their three children are preoccupied in a large play area beside the promenade, which includes a paddling pool, a boating pool, water slides and a waterfall. There is also an activity playground and a mini-Formula One track. "They love it here; this is better than any amusement arcades. We were actually in Westport yesterday but there was nothing for the kids to do," says Celine.
Holidaying in Portstewart would prove cheaper for a family than any of the popular destinations in the South. A house can be rented for as little as £250 per week, but as yet there aren't very many Southern cars in sight. Opinions vary as to whether the new IRA cease-fire has already led to an increase in the numbers crossing the border. Either way July was a disastrous month for tourism in the North, and the general view is that the cease-fire came too late to make any major impact this year. It's still a long way from the summer of 1995, with its magic combination of a cease-fire and glorious weather.
Shivvani Kher, proprietor of a wine-bar and restaurant, says the "Twelfth Fortnight" was one of the quietest the town has ever seen. "People were afraid to leave their houses in Belfast, but it has picked up again now." In 1995, she says "there was a lovely, carefree atmosphere, but that has not returned yet".
Very few of the guest houses display full signs, the majority of those cruising the promenade being day-trippers. The cease-fire has undoubtedly lifted spirits, though, and the feeling is that Portstewart has the potential - and is just waiting - to take off again.
