2001-06-07: Giant's Causeway
Leaving Dunluce Castle, we followed the A2 a little further and turned onto the B146 coastal road shortly after Bushmills. Our next stop was to be the Giant’s Causeway. This natural wonder consists of about 40,000 hexagonal basalt columns which look like they have been hand-crafted by a giant. Legend has it that the giant in question, Fionn McCumhaill (or Finn McCool for the Irish-impaired) fancied a female giant living on Staffa Island (Scotland) and built some stepping stones to that island, where similar rock formations are present. The modern scientific explanation involves some hot lava errupting from underground and crystallizing into these hexagonal shapes some 60 million years ago.
We parked our car at the Visitor Information Centre and took the lower foot path out to the Grand Causeway since the cliff-top path was closed as a preventive measure against foot-and-mouth disease.
We were able to follow the foot path a little further until it was blocked again by a gate due to unstable cliff conditions. This was the closest we could get to the Chimney Tops, a feature in the face of the cliff that in 1588 was actually mistaken by the Spanish Armada for a part of Dunluce Castle and consequentially fired upon.
# Tuesday June 3, 2003 · André Radke
2001-06-07: Gortmore and Magilligan Beach 2001-06-08: Drumcliff and Killarney National Park