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| An exposure of columnar basalt |
Returning
from Co. Clare, having surveyed several County Geological Sites, the rest of
August was spent writing up site reports and helping to organise a temporary
exhibition at Beggars Bush, in the offices of the Geological Survey of Ireland. My next day out came as a real surprise.
The Giant's Causeway is Ireland’s best known geological site, with visitors from all over the world. Being very remote from Dublin, on the Co. Antrim coast, I hadn’t planned to go there. With Geotourism, education and public outreach being high on the agenda of the work of the Heritage Programme at the Geological Survey of Ireland, our boss - Matthew Parkes - considered it a good idea for its staff to see this spectacular World Heritage Site.
Setting off at a more reasonable hour, than when driving to Co. Clare, we arrived just before lunchtime. Coming from Dublin on the M1, the Mourne Mountains – carved out of Tertiary age granite - welcome you to Northern Ireland. Except for a fortified watchtower, erected during “the troubles”, nothing suggested that a border between two different countries had been crossed.
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| A general view |
The Giant's Causeway is Ireland’s best known geological site, with visitors from all over the world. Being very remote from Dublin, on the Co. Antrim coast, I hadn’t planned to go there. With Geotourism, education and public outreach being high on the agenda of the work of the Heritage Programme at the Geological Survey of Ireland, our boss - Matthew Parkes - considered it a good idea for its staff to see this spectacular World Heritage Site.
Setting off at a more reasonable hour, than when driving to Co. Clare, we arrived just before lunchtime. Coming from Dublin on the M1, the Mourne Mountains – carved out of Tertiary age granite - welcome you to Northern Ireland. Except for a fortified watchtower, erected during “the troubles”, nothing suggested that a border between two different countries had been crossed.
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| A detail of columnar basalt |
Skirting around Belfast, we left the motorway network and, quite eerily for me, passed through a village where kerbs and various other places were painted in the “English red, white and blue”. At that point, Finnian seemed concerned about the fact that we were driving in a car with Dublin number plates.
Not
long after leaving this place, I was tempted to ask the rest of the party to
stop at the village of Bushmills - so that I could buy a bottle of what I know
to be an extremely good whiskey; however, we pressed on to see some fantastic
geology instead.
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| Another view of columnar basalt |
Having
been on a field trip to Mt. Etna – a week after it had erupted - mapped the Borrowdale Volcanics, climbed Stromboli at night, luxuriated
in the hot springs of Vulcano, and felt the ground trembling and hissing
beneath my feet in the crater on Nisyros – I looked forward to seeing this ancient volcanic place.
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| Basalt deeply weathered to form red laterite |
I had grown up seeing images of the Giant’s Causeway and Fingal’s Cave and my first impression was that it looked really small. It was another cloudy day and I didn't see it in its best light, but
I was a bit disappointed. Quickly
taking a few obligatory photos of the hexagonal columns and the ball and socket joints, we all moved on to explore the bay and the cliffs beyond.
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| A general view |
For me, the red laterites, which record the intense weathering in a hot and humid tropical climate that existed in the early Tertiary period, are the most interesting feature and if I had been on my own, I would have had a much closer look at the variety of geology that can be seen here. I can’t really say what the tourist facilities are like here; we just stopped in the car park to eat and went to look at the rocks - before going on to Carrick-a-Rede...
