The Beautiful Antrim Coast

We took off from Newcastle decently early this morning, as I knew we would need a lot of time to take in the Antrim Coast.  Newcastle has a very modern look to it, they have poured a tonne of money into a promenade, which is used extensively by the locals.  As the promenade is  right outside our apartment, we had a view of all the people that walked the promenade all day and into the evening.  There are also many modern coffee shops and the like, but everything tends to close very early in the off season.

The traffic on the motorway through Belfast was fairly terrible, with quite a few delays and it was slow going.  We missed an exit in the numerous roundabouts, but got back on track very easily.  After we went passed all of the exits into Belfast, things greatly improved.

We decided to take the scenic coastal route, so we headed to Carrickfergus, which has a rather imposing looking castle.  The Anglo-Normans built the castle in the late 1170s to guard the approach to the Belfast Lough.

Carrickfergus Castle

Carrickfergus Harbour

The further north one travels, the ever more beautiful the landscape becomes.  The tiny coastal towns are less modern.  We needed a tea break, so we pulled over and asked a local where to go, and she sent us to the next town, which was 3 miles down the highway.  The place was rustic, and served a standard Irish pot of tea.

The day was absolutely gorgeous with mainly sunny skies and a bit of cloud.  The Irish countryside is a palette of greens, so many greens, given the sun and shade and dappled light.  We had planned on a walk in the Glenariff, one of the many glens of Antrim.  There is a forest park at the head of the glen with some wonderful waterfalls, which were likely even more spectacular due to the recent rainfall.

Ess-Na-Crub - The Fall of the Hooves

Glenariff

Ess-na-Larach - The Fall of the Mare

After we left the Glenariff Forest Park we continued north and took a very narrow, twisty road up and then down to Torr Head.  This is a gorgeous setting, where the torr juts out into the Irish Sea.  This is the closest point of Ireland to Scotland,  the Mull of Kintyre is only 12 miles away.  We walked to the top of the torr where there is a ruin of a coastguard station that was built in 1822.  The wind was really strong today and we got hammered by the wind at the top of the torr but the views are unbelievable.

Views from Torr Head

Then we headed to Murlough Bay, which is a rocky shoreline with great views as well.  There are also large cliffs with bizarre rock formations here. We walked through saturated sheep pasture to get to the shore, when we came back, a trio of sheep were busy licking a rock.

Murlough Bay

It was getting late and we were past due for check-in to our cottage and had no cell signal, so when we reached Ballycastle, I texted our host and she said it was no problem and we should enjoy the sunshine.  There were two more tremendous beaches on the very north coast of Northern Ireland, which we drove by, and hope to check out tomorrow.

Our cottage is part of an old farm, and the owners lease out their land to another farmer now.  The owner is incredibly laid back and very kind.  She had a fireplace all set up for us to light in the sitting room, so after supper we decided to light this fire.  It lit up and proceeded to go totally berserk and smoked the place out.  We had two smoke detectors buzzing, and we filled the sitting room and kitchen with smoke.  After opening a couple of doors to air things out, the smoke abated as it seemed to require more oxygen.  It is now doing nicely, but we are one and done with fires.

The wind is fierce tonight but we are in a cozy old cottage with walls that are about two feet thick, judging by the window sills.  We are hoping that the weather holds for tomorrow and the wind abates as we want to walk the North Antrim Cliff path without getting blown off.

The scenery up here really is mind blowing, if anyone ever finds themselves in Northern Ireland, the Antrim Coast is the place to explore.  We are out of our minds over this place.

The History of Ireland Continues

The English barons held their lands under military tenure, where they were supposed to provide forces for the English king, but since the English kings rarely turned up in Ireland, the barons kept private armies and went out of control.  Irish farmers were tossed off the land and the laws which were supposed to apply to the English and the Irish were ignored.  The Irish were excluded from the law, they were deemed unfree and had no access to the courts.  It was not until 1541, that all subjects were included in the laws.

The hostility and animosity between the English settlers, which are now referred to as Anglo-Irish, and the native Irish went on for hundreds of years.  The Black death arrived in 1348, it killed between 35 - 50% of the population.  The numbers of Anglo-Irish lords declined and they forged a new identity for themselves; now they were anti English-born and of course anti native Irish.  They passed laws in 1366 which forbade all contact between the Irish and the English.  Marriage was outlawed, the clergy were to be English, and all the English were not to take on any Irish customs, dress, or speak Irish.  Any wonder there would never be any integration.

King Henry VIII became involved in Ireland in 1541, as he was now the King of Ireland, rather than Lord of Ireland.  All of the Irish were to be his subjects.  Monastic lands were confiscated and given to the English, the Irish accepted institutional change but would not accept change in religious doctrine.  Henry’s daughter, Elizabeth, became queen in 1558; she was a Protestant and England was now a Protestant state.  The Irish and the Anglo-Irish, now referred to as Old English, were Catholic and much opposed to Elizabeth. They sought assistance from Catholic France and Spain.  Loyal and disloyal were now based on religious doctrine, a division that would remain for the next 500 years.

Catholics were excluded and marginalised, while the Protestant minority flourished and held powerful positions.  The Old English rebellion of 1579 - 1583 failed.  The Irish lords rebelled in 1595, and in 1601, they sought the assistance of Philip of Spain, who sent a force.  However,  the English blocked the port and the Spanish could not land.  By 1603, the Irish lords were crushed, their lands confiscated, and Irish culture was outlawed; this was essentially the end of old Gaelic order and the completion of the conquest of Ireland by the English.   In 1607, the Irish lords of Ulster fled Ireland, this is known as the ‘flight of the earls.’

Thus began the colonization of Ulster, in the northeast.  Between 1610 and 1640, 10,000 Scots settled in Co Down and Co Antrim, while 30,000 English settled in Ulster.  The Irish were marginalised to such an extent that they developed a severe hatred for the new settlers.  The Irish Parliament did not sit regularly, only when parliamentary approval was required.  The Old English, who were Catholic, had a majority of seats until James I created new constituencies, which gave the majority to the new English Protestants.

The Irish were subject to high rents on marginal land, their share of land ownership had declined over the years and they were forced to pay for Protestant churches even though they were Catholic.  All of these factors led to intense levels of hatred and resentment.   In 1641, the Irish rebelled, they planned the uprising to force King Charles and the parliament in England to stop interfering in Ireland.  However, the rebellion transformed into an uprising by the people and it exploded into a violent slaughter of English and Scottish settlers.

Mourne Coastal Route and Neolithic Monuments

We had chores to do this morning, as this is our last day in Co. Down.  Due to time constraints and the fact that there is so much to see in Co. Down and Armagh, we decided to ditch Belfast and explore south Co. Down.

We began by taking the Mourne Coastal Route south of Newcastle.  After failing to find the Kilteaghan Dolmen, which is somewhere in a farmer’s field, we drove onto Warrenpoint, which is situated at the head of Carlingford Lough.  This is supposed to be a beautiful area, but we could not see it as the mist was so heavy.  There are two castles on either side of Carlingford Lough, which they built at the same time to guard the Lough, one is in Northern Ireland and one is in the Republic of Ireland.  If we had more time, we would have loved to explore Carlingford, in the Republic of Ireland, as it is a medieval town.

We stopped in Warrenport for a cappuccino, and than wandered into the tourist information centre.  The attendant told us that the dolmen that we did not find, is actually quite difficult to locate, but we were on the correct road.  The roads are tiny and they cut right through farm yards and pass within feet of the walls of houses.  We were surprised by the density of houses and small farms in the countryside, which is not like the highlands of Scotland where houses are few and far between.

While we were in the tourist information centre a group of young kids came into the lobby, all dressed in school uniforms and they started to play their tin whistles.  Apparently, a large music competition was going on with students from all the local schools playing various instruments.  It was really cool and when they stopped playing, I clapped and told them they were wonderful. This caused their teacher to whip around in shock, she smiled and thanked me.  We were wondering if we should have just stayed and attended the music competition, rather than roam the countryside in search of Neolithic monuments.

The area is so rich in Neolithic monuments and old castles that we could have spent a lot more time here.  In order to get anywhere, you have to drive to Newry, all roads lead to Newry and none lead away, (this is John’s line, hahaha) making it a traffic nightmare. We got through Newry and headed to Slieve Gullion Forest Park in Co. Armagh, in search of a couple of burial cairns.  However, by the time we got to the top of the mountain we could not see a damn thing.  When a weather system comes in, fog and rain come with it, and visibility is terrible.  This weather is accompanied by strong winds that bring the rain sideways, so you get soaked no matter what you do, while putting your umbrella in peril.  It was about a half hour walk through the mist to somewhere up the mountain to the cairn, but we had to abandon ship and head down.

Then we drove through the countryside to a couple of Neolithic monuments, there is no signage directing you to the monument, so a GPS with the monument listed is necessary.  We took some very narrow donkey roads through grazing land.  To get to one of the monuments, we had to cut through a field that was cut to shreds by cattle hooves.

By the time we visited the last monument it was getting late, so we took off for Newry and headed back down the Mourne Coastal Route to Newcastle, it poured rain all afternoon and evening.  Just outside of Warrenpoint, we stopped to have a look at Narrow Water Castle.  Since we were on the wrong side of the highway, we had to run across to get to the castle, which sits right beside the Newry River.

Ballykeel Dolmen

This dolmen or portal tomb, is known locally as the ‘Hag’s Chair.’  There was a large stone cairn and a burial chamber or cist near the dolmen, which acted as the entrance to the burial cairn.

Ballymacdermot Cairn

This is a court tomb that dates from 3500 BC.  There are three burial chambers that would have been covered by a stone cairn.  This is the best preserved court tomb in Armagh.

Narrow Water Castle

Dating from the 1560s, this is a tower house, a type of fortified stronghold.  The tower house was built on the river to protect the crossing point in the river and to guard the seaward approach from Carlingford Lough to Newry.

Tomorrow we head north to drive the Antrim coast.  Hopefully, the rain that is still pelting down tonight, clears out by morning.  The forecast is favourable so far.

The History of Ireland - The English Invasion

There is so much history with regard to the long struggle with the English, I will try, but in all likelihood, I will fail to provide a short version, as there really isn’t one.  An Irish king, Murchada, was battling a couple of other Irish kings for control of Dublin and the southeast.  He went to Henry II, king of England to seek assistance.  Henry allowed him to recruit mercenaries from Wales.  In Wales, an English Baron, Strongbow, agreed to assist in return for marriage to Murchada’s daughter and to become king when Murchada died.  Strongbow’s forces were highly successful in Ireland, he married the daughter and became king when Murchada died in 1171.

This alarmed the other Irish kings and Henry II, who came to Ireland with his forces.  Several Irish kings declared for Henry II, thinking he would protect them from the English barons.  However, Henry took Dublin, Wexford and Waterford for himself and gave nearby lands to his own barons and a large tract of land in Meath, to a close friend.

Henry wanted Ireland as a separate kingdom for his son, John, who he sent to Ireland in 1185.  John alienated both the English and the Irish and returned to England.  In 1210, John went back to Ireland and the English barons and Irish kings submitted to him.  He managed to establish English common law for both the English and the Irish.

When the Normans conquered England in 1066, it only took a couple of generations before the Normans considered themselves to be English.  However, the English would never describe themselves as Irish, even though thousands of English and Welsh settlers came to Ireland.

Historically, the Irish were a warring people involved in cattle raiding and slave-trading.  The English criticized everything Irish and basically denounced the Irish.  They viewed the Irish as primitive, inferior, outlandish, deprived and pagan.  Irish clothing, style of horse-riding and even the Irish hairdo came under fire from the English settlers.  The Irish wore long mustaches and the hair at the back of the head was shaven, while the hair on top of the head was combed forward over the eyes.

The problem for the first English settlers was that the Irish considered them to be English and the English considered them to be Irish, they were hated by both.  Very few English kings even visited Ireland, although they wouldn’t leave the Scots or the Welch alone, they just did not care about Ireland.

The medieval conquest of Ireland by the English was never completed, there was no bond formed between the settlers and the native Irish, when the Tudors finally completed the conquest, it was too late for integration, the course taken by the English was that of repression.

Slieve Donard

The sun was visible this morning, but rain was forecast for around 2:00 pm, so we got a move on to hike up Slieve Donard.  There are a few approaches to Slieve Donard, we chose the approach via Bloody Bridge.  It is said that Bloody Bridge is so named, as it was the site of a massacre of prisoners during the 1641 Rebellion.

Slieve Donard is the highest mountain in the Mournes, at ~2800 feet, the hike begins pretty much at sea level.  After walking for some time, we got to a rock quarry, shortly after, we reached the Mourne Wall, which runs up the steep slope to the top of Slieve Donard.

The elevation gain begins in earnest here, as you have to boot it straight up the mountain.  It is quite steep, but at least it was only 1 kilometre to the top, which took us less than 45 minutes.  Total time to reach the summit was about 2 hours and 15 minutes.  It was pretty heavy going, given that we walked up Slieve Binnian yesterday.  Considering we have not hiked since last August, we were fairly amazed that we were capable of two hikes in a row.

It was not busy at all, given that it is a Monday, quite a contrast from the number of walkers out on the weekend.  We only met one group on our ascent and then chatted at length to an older Irishman at the top.  He is pretty fit and was wanting to get into better shape for a hiking trip to Scotland, where the mountains are higher.

It is always really cold at the top of Irish mountains, as the temperatures are lower and we are more exposed to the wind.  Once again, we took a bottle of tea for each of us, and were grateful for that.  We had to don toques, a windblock fleece and gloves to stop from freezing.

Then a young guy came up with his Rottie, this of course, was a topic of conversation with him.  He is going to school for a career in veterinary physiotherapy.  Now, he notices the problems with the gait of every dog, horse and human that he encounters.

After hanging around at the summit for a bit talking to the locals, we took off to descend the mountain and head back to Bloody Bridge.  There are cattle and sheep grazing in the area, and we encountered a small herd of Highland Cattle blocking the trail and eating some hay that the farmer threw beside the trail among the gorse plants, which have vicious thorns.  After taking a few photos we walked on and they moved aside.

As we got near Bloody Bridge and the end of the walk, it started to rain, so our timing was perfect.  It is supposed to rain a lot tomorrow, which is our last day in Co. Down, so we are finished with hiking in the Mourne Mountains, not that we want to take on another mountain tomorrow.

The Mourne Wall ascending Slieve Donard

View from the summit

The Mourne Wall

The stile gets you over the wall at the top

Slieve Binnian from Slieve Donard

The never ending Mourne Wall from Slieve Donard

Highland Cattle

Crossing Bloody Bridge River

Old Bloody Bridge

The Arrival of the Vikings

The Christian annals (chronological records) referred to the arrival of the ‘sea vomitings from the north’ which wrecked havoc by raiding, killing and taking the people for slaves; they of course, were the Norse Vikings.  The Vikings are given a short shrift in the annals and by some historians, as they are depicted as not much more than violent and destructive people who plundered and pillaged.  The Vikings began by raiding coastal areas in 795, and continued to raid for the next 30 years, and then they moved inland to sack the wealthy monasteries.  However, the Vikings established a few naval camps, Dublin was one of them and it became a great trading centre.  They also established the first towns in Ireland: Limerick, Cork, Waterford and Wexford.  By the 11th century, there is plenty of evidence of intermarriage between the Vikings and the Irish.

During the 10th century the Vikings were very involved in the power struggle in Ireland, but by the early 11th century, their power was in decline, and by the end of the 11th century, their power in Ireland had come to an end.  However, the Viking period had lasted for nearly 300 years, they viewed Ireland, Britain and the islands as one area of operations and they underwent a transformation from raiders to settlers to traders and to power brokers.

It is important to note that the Vikings had less interest in Ireland than in Britain, which had more towns and was wealthier.  The Viking presence in England may have united the people to form a single monarchy to fight the Vikings.  This did not happen in Ireland, where the Vikings allied with various kingships in the power struggle, but they did not attempt a widespread takeover.

The Mourne Mountains

Percy French sang, “the Mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea” . . .   We are here for these mountains, which shocks the Irish, and today we decided to just head to the Mournes, although the weather looked dodgy.

The Mourne Wall is absolutely amazing, it is a 22 mile, or 35.5 km, dry stacked, stone wall that took more than 18 years to complete, it was finished in 1922.  The Mourne Wall connects the summits of 15 mountains, it tops out in places at 8 feet high and is 3 feet wide.  The wall was constructed to prevent sheep and cattle from entering the Silent Valley reservoir area, which supplies water to the region.

It was raining this morning when we left Newcastle, but it had tapered off to a drizzle by the time we parked the car.  We took on Slieve Binnian, a mucky slog up the mountain, alongside the wall of stone. We couldn’t see the top of the mountain for cloud cover, but it was supposed to clear in the afternoon.  We met a lot of Irish walkers on our ascent, some were coming down, but the majority were on their way up.

When we hike in Canada, we are rarely passed, we tend to hike faster than most people even though they are about a 1/3 of John’s age.  But the Irish are part of that great walking culture that is prevalent in Scotland and England.  We passed some of the more out of shape types, but a couple of young people flew by us.  The young woman was totally hilarious, she was talking about her heart being ready to give out.  I said that I guess there are other things to do on a Sunday and she replied, ‘like drink tea and watch shit tv.’  I just about died laughing.  Later on at the summit, she commented that it all sounded like such a great idea to climb Binnian last night in the pub after a couple of drinks, but now she thought it wasn’t such a great idea.

There were loads of people hiking and more kept on coming as the day wore on.  Just as we were about to leave the summit we met a dad and his two young boys.  I was so favourably impressed with this, so I said that is great that such young kids were hiking.  The dad said that today is the birthday of the older boy and he wanted to walk up Binnian on his birthday.  I said ‘are you ever a cool kid.’  His face totally lit up and I received the biggest smile that has ever been directed my way.

When we got to the summit, we couldn’t see much due to cloud.  We stood at the top and had a tea that we had dragged up with us, this is not something we would ever do, but thought it would be a good idea to have a warm drink on a cool day.  The tea was divine.  As there was so much low cloud, we thought we would have to walk back down the mucky slog, but after the cloud cleared, we decided to continue on with the ridge walk to the north and complete a circuit.  This made for a great hike, as we got to see some really bizarre rock formations.

It took a lot longer to descent than we anticipated because there are several levels of slopes, just when we thought we were almost down, another slope would be there.

Once we got to a flat section, which continued on to meet up with our approach at the beginning, we met people who were packing little kids, maybe one or two year olds.  One was in a backpack rig and the older one was in a rig that the mom had on in front.  Well, we were completely floored by this and told them how unreal it was that they were packing kids on their walk, I told them they have a real walking culture here.  The Irish people are so awesome, and we absolutely love them.  We spent a decent amount of time yakking to them on the trail.

After we got back to the car, which took forever, we sped home for tea.  The walk took us about 4.5 hours, and elevation gain is unknown, approximately 2500 feet.  All of the Irish think we should hike Slieve Donard, which is the highest mountain in Northern Ireland, if we are capable of walking tomorrow, we may take a crack at it.

Summit in the mist

View from the summit

The Back Castles

Gap in the wall

The wall going downhill

View of the sea from Sieve Binnian

Summit Tor

The Mourne Wall ascending and descending Slieve Donard

North Tor

Buzzard's Roost (seriously)

History of Ireland, Second Installment

Patrick, the Patron Saint of Ireland is said to have arrived in 432 AD.  He said he was captured by Irish raiders at his home in Britain and worked as a slave in Ireland for six years.  Having escaped, he managed to return home and then came back to Ireland as a missionary.  Patrick basically wrote himself into the history of Ireland, but his writings lacked dates, names, places, and he did not expand upon what he actually did, the blanks have been filled in by pure legend.  It is said that Irish scholars, who settled in Europe, started the tradition of celebrating St. Patrick’s Day, beginning in the 9th century.  Ironically, the parades and parties of today are more in keeping with a pagan feast and celebration than a Christian holy day.

We really don’t know much about the pagan practices of the Irish, although sun worship, woods, rivers and wells were sacred.  The Christians borrowed pagan practices as they knew that the people would not give up their traditions.  The pagan gods and goddesses became Christian saints; the conversion from paganism to Christianity took hundreds of years.

Early social organization consisted of petty kingdoms but the kings were not above poets, scholars or bishops, unlike England, which moved toward a single monarchy.  Farmsteads were surrounded by stone walls, although they were not fortified.  Wealth was determined by the size of the herd of cattle owned.

Monasteries became the centre of Irish culture.  While Europe fell into the ‘Dark Ages’ with the collapse of the Roman Empire, the Irish monks produced manuscripts and studied Latin, and foreign students came to Ireland to study.  Irish monks also travelled to Britain and to Europe, to establish monasteries.

The Roman Christian structure was known as the diocesan model, where bishops controlled junior priests and all the churches within their jurisdiction.  In Ireland, the structure was a monastic one, because of the link between the local church and the local king.  The church sat on tribal land which was not to leave the tribe, and many of the first priests were from the king’s family.  The monastery was ruled by an abbot who was often related to the kings and may not have been a priest. Much like the tribal kings, the monasteries also feuded with each other to gain power.

In the 9th century, the monasteries were major population centres, the monks married, had children and the tenant farmers worked the land.  The monasteries had wealth in the form of silver and gold.

Castle and Dolmen in the Irish Countryside

The time has come to wade into the long and complex history of Ireland.  Beginning with a little bit of ancient Ireland, I will then move onto the political history of Ireland.  This is fairly heavy going, so to help prevent the eyes glazing over phenomenon, I am going to parcel it out in smaller segments.

Ancient Ireland

According to archaeologists, Ireland was first inhabited ~10,000 years ago, during the Mesolithic period.  Passage tombs were constructed during the Neolithic period of 4,500 - 2,000 BC.  The tombs are of elaborate construction and some are calibrated to align with the midsummer sunset and winter solstice.  But we really know nothing of these early people, so I will have to leave it at that.

It seems as though the Keltoi or Celts, arrived from Europe near 700 BC.  It was thought that there was a large scale invasion from Europe around 500 BC; however, there is no archaeological evidence to support this theory.  No utensils that would have been in use by ordinary people have been found.  Also, there was no change in burial practices or lifestyle, which would have occurred in a conquered land.  It is more likely that groups arrived in Ireland over hundreds of years.

We do know that by the 1st century AD, the Gaels, a warrior group, were in control in Ireland because it was their language, culture and laws that were dominant.

The Gaels had an oral tradition where learning was by the poems and stories that were handed down.  Supposedly, the Romans thought the Gaels in continental Europe were elitists, as they would not share their knowledge through the written word.  The ancient legends were not recorded until monks wrote them hundreds of years later, inevitably, the monks would have incorporated their own biases into the legends.

The religion of the people was one of celebration, rather than one of obligation.  The main festivals were occasions of great celebration; a form of punishment was to be banned from attending a festival.

The Irish traded with the Roman empire but they were never conquered by the Romans; whereas, Britain, was conquered by the Romans in 43 AD.  As the Roman Empire in the west went into decline, the Romans were leaving Britain.  The Irish raided the British coast where they captured young people, to be sold into slavery.  The Irish settled parts of Britain; the settlement of Dal Riada in Argyle, Scotland, was a permanent colony.

We got off to a late start today, which was just as well, as it was a rainy morning.  By the time we got going in the early afternoon, things had improved.  Newcastle is not the type of place that we would choose to spend any vacation time in.  It is a seaside, resort type of town, with a lot of touristy stuff that holds little interest for us.  We are here for the Mourne Mountains, which are the highest in Northern Ireland and promise some fine walking.  However, we could not actually see the Mourne Mountains today, so we had to make alternate plans, which consisted of lower level walking.

We drove a bit north of here to the Castlewellan Forest Park.  Forest Parks are quite common here and are highly popular with the locals.  We stopped in at the information kiosk and told the friendly attendant that we needed a good, long walk.  He sent us on the most strenuous walk in the park, which really was a ‘walk in the park’ with little elevation gain to the summit of Slievenaslat.  However, the views of the Northern Ireland countryside were fantastic.  We cannot get enough of the rich green fields, which are laid out like an erratic quilt, bordered by dry stacked stone walls and hedges.

The beautiful Castlewellan Castle sits in a gorgeous setting on the edge of forest, overlooking the small lake.  The deciduous trees in the immediate vicinity are absolutely huge, a testament to the precipitation in Ireland.  The castle was built with locally quarried granite, and construction was completed in 1856.

Castlewellan Castle

Mountain lake on Slievenaslat

Mourne Mountains in cloud

View of countryside from summit of Slievenaslat

View toward the Irish Sea from Slievenaslat

We loved the cloud formation

Sun breaking through in foreground

I read about a wonderful dolmen in the area, so I asked the attendant at the forest park how to get there, he gave us directions, so we headed off into the countryside to find the dolmen.  This area is very beautiful, and the country is dotted with small farms.  It looks as though the farmers are mainly involved in raising cattle and sheep.  The incredible cream and cheese that we are buying are sourced from Northern Ireland.

A dolmen is a portal tomb, dating from 2500 to 2000 BC.  The Legananny Dolmen is a tripod dolmen, where the large capstone balances on three upright stones.  There is such a fine and beautiful balance to this dolmen, so much so, that it almost looks like the capstone is floating above the three upright stones.  It would have been covered with a mound of stone and earth by the builders.  The place in the landscape is on the slope of Slieve Croob, and now it is near a small cattle farm right alongside a narrow farm track.  We got really good light when we arrived at the dolmen as it was just a few hours before sunset and the cloud cover had cleared.  There are several dolmens in this area, and one could spend all day seeking them out.

I wondered if the farmers grew tired of all of the visitors walking right by their farm up to the dolmen, as this is one of the most photographed stone monuments in Ireland.  There is a sign urging people to park in the layby on the road, rather than driving up the farm track beside the farm.

Legananny Dolmen

Note the dolmen symbol in the gate

The view from our apartment near sunset

Passage Tombs of Neolithic Ireland

We caught the airport bus and picked up our rental car at the airport.  We had to get on a shuttle bus to the car rental area as it is some distance from the airport terminals.  Since everybody assumes we are Americans, the shuttle bus driver went on at some length about Obama having Irish ancestry, but really, who doesn’t have some Irish blood cursing through their veins.  Anyway, after he had gone on about Obama, we didn’t want to be arseholes, so we kept quiet about our nationality.

Thankfully we have learned over the years that it is very prudent to stay in the city of arrival for at least few nights before taking on driving out of a city, especially when we have to orient our brains to driving on the other side of the road.  It is somewhat nerve wracking when getting started and the speed limits in Ireland make us howl with laughter, as they will allow high speeds on narrow, twisty roads.

We headed north and then took off the highway to a small side road, to make our way to the Fourknocks passage tomb in Co. Meath.  This is how things work in Ireland, which endears the place to us; there is a locked steel door, and to get the key, you have to turn left at the green and white house and head down a narrow road to the 6th house on the right.  However, the directions I found online always said it was the 5th house, when we got to the 5th house, there was a sign on the gate pointing to the next house for the key.  I rang the bell of the 6th house and Mrs. White answered, she promptly gave me the key and wanted to know if we were going to Newgrange, I had not planned on it.  You have to leave a 20-Euro note with Mrs. White as a deposit for the key.  We then went to Fourknocks and the new sign states that you stop at the 6th house.

Fourknocks would have been built by Neolithic farmers, about 5,000 years ago.  Fourknocks is derived from the Irish Fuair Cnocs, meaning cold hills.  The hills were certainly cold today as a huge storm has been hitting Ireland for the last few days, to the point where there is a weather warning and a risk of flooding.  The southwest and west are really getting hammered, but it has come to the east with a vengeance.

When Fourknocks was excavated in the 1950s, there was no roof, but a post hole suggests that a pole may have supported the roof structure made of wood or hides.  The span of the chamber is so wide that it would have been impossible to have put up a corbelled roof of stone, as is the norm.  A metal-domed roof has been placed on the mound with small skylights, located to light up some of the wonderful rock art in this tomb.  Since the metal dome is modern technology, it leaks.

The tombs located in Ireland are quite special, as they have a lot of rock art, that is not the case in Orkney, where we visited tombs some years ago.  It really is a fantastic experience to stand in such an old structure and look at the work of the ancients.  There are four small chambers off the main large chamber.  There were fragments of dozens of human skeletons as well as stone beads, hammer pendants and bone pins.

View of the countryside from the Fourknocks mound

Entry into Fourknocks

Ancient stone art, zigzag, this would have been above the doorway

Chamber of Fourknocks

Fourknocks Passage

Fourknocks Mound

When we left Fourknocks we had more time than I had anticipated, so we thought we may as well go to Newgrange, so I asked Mrs. White what she thought and she suggested we go.  It was a fairly short drive across country on little roads through farmland.  We didn’t know if there would still be a tour or not, but there was a bus leaving the visitor’s centre in half an hour, at 3:15.  We went to the cafeteria to have tea, of course, the Irish make fantastic tea, none of this watery dish water we get at home.  We then headed to the bus, there were seven of us on the bus.  The weather was just horrific, pouring rain and a bloody strong wind.  You have to imagine that the tombs were constructed at the top of hills, so things were fairly brutal.

Newgrange is the big tourist draw as far as tombs go, so I didn’t really want to go there as it is heavily restored on the outside, and you have to go with a tour guide.  However, it is an amazing tomb and was well worth the visit.  The passage is really long, relative to the tombs we have visited, but a nearby tomb, Knowth, is even longer.  The passage goes uphill and there are really interesting reasons for this.  From the outside, there is a light box over top of the entrance, this is for the sun to enter the tomb and travel along the passageway and into the main chamber.  The light box is at the level of our feet when we get to the chamber so the sunlight hits the floor in the middle of the chamber.  Three things had to be lined up for this to work: the sun at the horizon, the opening of the light box and the floor of the chamber.  The alignment only lasts for 21 minutes on the solstice.  The neolithic farmers were expert engineers, as everything was dry stacked stone, no concrete to keep things in place.

The guide claims that the roof was intact and has not been restored, which is amazing, as it is a corbelled roof of huge stone slabs and it does not leak and has never leaked.  The Neolithic builders etched out sloping channels for the water when they joined the rocks together.

Although the Newgrange mound is huge, the chamber is smaller than the chamber at Fourknocks.  The archaeologists have not discovered evidence of another chamber, but it seems possible.  There are a myriad of theories with regard to Newgrange, really, most is speculative, as we don't know what meaning the tombs had, if they were tombs, or why they built them.  It seems to us, that a lot of the theories are based on modern thinking, which we don't necessarily agree with.

The entrance of Newgrange is very heavily restored and the reconstruction is based on theory as well, which remains controversial.  They now believe that the reconstructed angle of the wall was not possible.  Also, the white stone, which is quartz, that has been attached to the wall, may not have been used to face the wall at all, it may have been simply spread on the ground in front of the mound. The modern take on Newgrange is rather jarring, relative to all of the tombs that we have visited.

The rock art in Newgrange is fabulous, a unique form is the triple spiral, of which there are two in the tomb.  They also speculate that the large upright stones in the chamber have been pebbled so that when the sun hits them during the solstice, the sunlight would shimmer and suggest movement.

When we left the tomb, it was ferocious outside with the rain coming at us sideways.  All in our group ditched out and headed for the bus; however, we walked around the outside of the tomb and took photos of the large kerb stones with rock art.  The rest of the group had to wait for us on the bus, but we are fast movers so they didn’t have to wait very long.

Newgrange entrance with light box above

Kerb stone with rock art at back of mound

After we left Newgrange, we headed to Northern Ireland to Newcastle in Co. Down.  The drive was a bit of a trial in the torrential rain and it was getting dark.  The worst part was the flooding on the roads, at one point the car skidded a bit sideways when we hit a lake on the road.  Keep in mind that these are fairly narrow roads and are all lined in hedges, which annoy us.

When we finally got to Newcastle, we had to find an ATM to get GBP to pay for our apartment, we had to ask people where to find one, as it was pitch dark and all streets are one-way and the traffic was nuts.  The people are excellent and happy to help.  I was texting the apartment owner and had to keep putting off our arrival time as the drive took longer than we anticipated.

We finally got to the apartment and got everything sorted, but we needed to go and get groceries.  Since we were feeling burnt out on driving, we decided to walk.  We missed a turn and walked a long way up the wrong road, figured it out, turned around and then got on the correct road to the Tesco.  We then had a long and hilarious conversation with the young stock guy in the wine department.  He is a beer drinker, omg, who isn’t, everywhere we travel, beer seems to be the beverage of choice.  To make things even more hysterical, his beer of choice is Canadian beer, we just about fell over, as he didn’t know we were Canadian.  However, he came through, as he said his brother liked a particular red wine that was on special, so we grabbed it, and lo and behold, it was pretty good.

After we got back to the apartment soaking wet, we had some much needed wine and then cooked dinner, finally dining around 10:00 P.M.  The weather is supposed to be wicked tomorrow as well, so we will see what we get up to then.