Giant's Causeway

When last heard from our party was at the Dunluce castle on the northernmost coast of Ireland.  From there we went to the Giant's Causeway - the primary objective for the trip north.  As you may recall, it had been highly recommended to us by a quite drunk young lady in The Temple Bar about a week before.  We were not disappointed.

It was quite a hike from the visitor's center (which incidentally was closed as they are building a new one), but it was mostly downhill and we knew that for one euro we could get a bus back up.  This was a great comfort to me.  We basically walked down from the top of the cliff that you see on the far left side of this picture around the bay pictured here, and then around another bay to get to the Giant's Causeway.  We couldn't figure out why they hadn't put the visitor's center closer.  Ah well.

Folklore has it that a giant named Finn McCool (don't you just love that name?) built the causeway to be able to walk over to Scotland because he had a lady love over there. They figure he must have been 54 feet tall.  (There is a rock on the shore that is supposed to be his boot.)  Apparently a Scottish Giant got mad at him and destroyed the causeway.

The geological explanation isn't as interesting and involves volcanic activity.  This was, however, one of the coolest places I have ever seen.

The stones are amazingly shaped - mostly are almost perfect hexagons.  They form a penisula which sticks way out in to the water.  The darker stones are the ones that are under water at high tide.

 People are allowed to climb all over the entire thing.

Have you ever sen such a place?  I certainly have not.  I understand it was a runner-up in the contest for the "new" seven wonders of the world. 

We caught the bus back up the hill and had a scrumptuous lunch at the Hotel/Restaurant next to where the Visitor Center was supposed to be.  The food in Ireland has been uniformly delicious and served hot, which we have all enjoyed.

This concluded our overnight trip to Northern Ireland.  We drove the three hours "home" to Dublin and got a quick dinner from the Take-Out place just down from the house.