When we came back from Castlerock, I started to tell Doro about the sea.
“Doro, did you see the sea?”
“Yes, I saw the sea.”
“Yeah, but did you see the sea?”
“Yes.” *grumpy face.
“But the sea! There was sea! Everywhere! Did you see it?”
slaps my face
After an hour or so of telling her how amazing the sea was and is and will ever be I could convince her to come with me on another trip. To the sea.
This picture is a hint of where we were heading.
But first: Cows.
We took the rambling Causeway rambler to the Causeway. What Causeway you might ask. The Giant’s Causeway of course, the one tourist attraction that is in every tourist book about Northern Ireland. The rambling Rambler is a scenic bus route that stops at several tourist sites to spill out tourists on the sites. It is a good choice for those who are as immobile as we were.
We had a beautiful day.
When arriving at the causway all the streams of tourists are directed into the tourist information center. Basically a fancy gift shop. That costs 8 pound entry fee. To spend afterwards more money on gifts and food. We thought “No thank you, but you can not make us pay this amount of money we’re Germans and we only pay for good value and also this is our land now.” Or something similar.
When you avoid the big signs pointing at the Tourist Point entrance you can actually find the way around. And then you directly get to THE CAUSEWAY!
Well not directly. That’s not The Causeway of the Giants. We followed a natural occurring road to the area of outstanding beauty. Did I mention there were tourists?
They were brought there in big buses full with old and slow people. They poured in large groups onto the area, clutching to their audio guides they rented for horrendous amounts of money because the tour guide said so and wanted to avoid telling the stories actually himself.
We just took it slow, and slipped between two waves of touristy beasts.
Hah. People are awful.
Did I mention how beautiful the day was?
If I remember one thing from Northern Ireland it was the huge green cliffs. Every centimeter is covered in moss or grass or bushes. And everything is so green it looks like someone messed around in real world photoshop.
Black volcanic stones surrounded little ponds of seawater for the first bit of the way to The Causeway.
Sea. Did you see it?
Maybe I do not hate these people. They are calm. And they enjoy the sun. A rare sight in the Norths of the Irish Island.
We’re getting close to THE CAUSEWAY!
There it is. The beginning of THE CAUUUUSEWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!
But first: a pond.
The Giant’s Causeway! A Causeway for Giants!
Okay, this person is kind of tiny.
Sea. See?
The Causeway. Known for its hexagonal basalt columns. They are all over the place!
The cliff and the Causeway in front. Luckily with only a few of invading tourists. The people in red are guides and guards from the tourist center that make sure that all questions are answered and no one dies there. It’s a good place to die.
The patterns are indeed quite impressive.
Doro standing on the face of the Causeway like a Boss.
And the very tip of the Causeway. Ending in the sea. SEA!
At this point you might wonder: Why does the Causeway consist of this hexagonal basalt columns? Who put them there? Is it even legal? Where is the construction license? Which form do I have to fill in if I want my own Causeway in the garden?
Fear not, Answers are near. Maybe not for these questions, but hey, take the answers or leave them, I don’t care, I just answer and I only do as I’m told.
The legend says that the Causeway was constructed ages ago by a giant named Finn MacCool. Really. Finn MacCool was so cool that he wanted beef with the next giant in Scotland, named Bennandonner. So Finn constructed the Causeway as a bridge spanning the waters between Ireland and Scotland. But when he approached Bennandonner for a good beating he realised that Bennandonner was stronger and bigger than him. He hurried quickly back home and hid there. His wife Úna saw the whiny giant and had an idea. She dressed him up as a baby and when Bennandonner arrived, she opened the door smiling. She offered some giant’s tea and told Bennandonner that unfortunately he can’t beat up her husband, as he is out of town. Only Úna and her son are at home. She then pointed to Baby-Finn. When seeing the giant baby, Bennandonner got struck in fear, that the father must be huge, when his baby son was already nearly a full grown giant. He then ran away, destroying the Causeway behind him to avoid being hunt down by Finn. That’s why only a little piece remains today of the whole Causeway.
Finn and Úna then got into some weird role playing, but that’s another story.
As interesting as this story is, it is unfortunately not entirely true. The boring reality is, that a bazillion million trillion lightyears ago a volcano erupted. It is not know if it was also a Sharkcano. A huge stream of Lava was running down the country and as it began to cool, it cooled quicker on the outside than on the inside. The outer layer contracted and similar to drying mud in the sun, a hexagonal pattern emerged. Some of the columns eroded but quite a bit remained and can be seen today on the Giant’s Causeway.
Just as we left the central area a huge wave of tourists and whole class of children splashed on the site. We hurried away.
This is stretch of the Causway reaching into The Sea.
The people gave all kinds of silly names to different structures. This one is “The Organ” although a keyboard is clearly missing.
This is one rare flower known by the name of “Brown dry flowery thing”.
A bit of red stone a the far edge of the cliff.
This is the whole Causeway seen from above. It is actually quite small. The area to the left and right are made from similar volcanic stones, but they are washed to round shapes and therefore are considered uninteresting by the tourist folks.
The bus carries the lame and lazy to the Causeway, let’s them take their photos and brings them back to the starting point where they buy their postcards and get back on the bus to continue touring the land.
Doro.
I present you: Me presenting you the Cliffs.
Ah, these cliffs. Sheep are running around on the cliffs. They probably taste delicious.
Some tourist offered us to take a picture. That’s why it’s focused on the stone and the light is bad. But hey, evidence that I was with Doro. Look how German we look.
A herd of japanese tourists. Not on the phone but listening to audio guides. Better suit up when going into the nature.
Beautiful skies.
We went into the tourist info point through the back entry where there is no check for tickets. We used their bathroom and had a look at the kitsch they were selling to the tourist people. Nothing really interesting. So we went on.
We then headed back to the rambler bus and went to Bushmill were the famous Irish whiskey is made. But we couldn’t make the tour, as they closed quite early.
We took another bus and I forced Doro to get off the bus in Castlerock. Because Sea. We spent an hour walking on the beach looking at the Sea. I like the sea.
When the sun started to set we headed back to Derry. Unfortunately there was no more sea to see.
