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near Coleraine, Northern Ireland
The best part of Northern Ireland was the people who took us in -- Servas hosts Hilary and her daughter Mary. We felt completely at home, instructed, welcomed, and treasured. If we are ever to serve as Servas hosts we hope we can do as well! | ||
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Which is not to say that Northern Ireland isn't beautiful, restful, and bucolic -- it is. The town of Coleraine is shabby but trying hard. We were only there for a few minutes before Hilary fetched us up and whisked us to a lovely home beside a cow pasture within view of the distant coast. Unlimited internet access, good conversation, a teenage daughter who likes Big Brother (British flavor -- MUCH better than the mean-spirited US version), two cats, and a dog!
Hilary is a statistician studying theology -- a fascinating combination -- with a real ear for the absurdities and humor of her own life, the Northern Irish situation, and our shared language. Sample: "An Irishman, a Scotsman, and an Englishman go into a bar. The bartender says, 'Is this a joke?'"
After dinner we took a lovely long walk in the long northern gloaming, past lots of cows and horses -- no fraternization; the foot-and-mouth scare is still very real in the minds of the stockmen if no one else's -- and through a little settlement bedecked with Unionist flags including those of the Ulster Volunteer Force, a semi-secret Protestant militant organization. Surprisingly, the children playing on the sidewalk, including the teenagers, were cordial and quick to meet our eyes and say hello. Hilary's analysis is that this generation of children are the first to even see members of the "opposition" in their daily lives. When she was young, living south of Coleraine, her whole life was sequestered in a Protestant "bubble" -- school, church, after-school and family life. The next generation, the children of these children, will most likely all go to school together (schools are still segregated, but integration is being discussed seriously.) Hilary also reminded us that understanding of "The Irish Question" has evaded the best minds of more than a century, and so we shouldn't even bother to try, only observe and experience.
The next morning was drizzly and grim -- surprise! Hilary comforted us by noting that all the population centers and places of human importance are on the eastern side of these islands. "If you wanted the ermine robes and finery to last, you couldn't be keeping it out here in the west, now, could you?" she quite sensibly asked. |
Nevertheless, about lunchtime Mary drove us out to the coast at Giant's Causeway, the local focus of touristic interest. We could tell by the tour busses it was important, but after a lovely tea in the National Trust shop we set out across the bluff tops and within a few hundred yards we could look over the cliff and see the Causeway below. |  first view of the Giant's Causeway |
 Looking down from the cliff |
"Is that all?" asked Rochelle when we had gotten a little closer. I knew what we were looking at, and was prepared to be impressed.
You see, the Giant's Causeway is what's left of the path Finn McCool -- a most hospitable giant -- built across the sea by way of invitation to the next giant north, a Scottish Giant to be sure, to come over and get his bum thumped in a friendly little battle.
Well, when Finn saw the Scottish Giant coming, he realized he was outmatched, so he went home to his wife and she dressed him in a baby's cap and put him in the crib. When the Scot Giant arrived, she apologized that her husband was away, but said the visitor couldn't go without seeing her baby. Impressed with the babe's size, the Scotsman excused himself and headed hastily back north, destroying the causeway behond him in fear of pursuit by the giant who'd fathered such a babe. |
And so the remains of the causeway stands to this day, diminished only a little by erosion of waves and weather.
As we clambered down the stairway and trail to get down to causeway level, I was taken by the delicacy of the flowers and matted grasses ...although I'll spare you the photo. This is a forbidding place even in what passes for summer in these parts, and it's easy to imagine the way the ocean must howl in winter. Given the few tourists we'd seen on the train and in Coleraine, the mobs clambering about the Causeway were remarkable. I was beginning to subscribe to Rochelle's point of view, thinking that a region must be pretty barren of true attractions if so many people flock to something as tame as this... |
 Rochelle and Michael on Shepherd's Steps
photo credit: Chad Abramson |
 lichen adorning the columns |
And then we were there, and the reason we had come so far to see The Giant's Causeway became clearer. What a wondrous work!
"Enough about McCool," Chad insisted, "what really happened here?
 In awe, my scientific mind couldn't resist offering an explanation. A long time ago -- the geologists say 60,000 years -- lava flowed thickly and quickly here, and stayed molten for long enough that internal convection cells developed, like those one might see in tea with cream allowed to sit and cool. |
 Similar cells are responsible for the way a mud puddle cracks into tiles; the height of the cells is proportional to the slowness of the cooling. Nature loves hexagons -- the largest number of sides in a polygon that can regularly tesselate a plane -- and so the tea, the mud puddle, and Finn McCool's causeway, are all tiled with hexagonal cells.
For a look at another like geographical phenomenon, check out Devil's Postpile in California. |
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We watched the hoardes clambering back onto their busses after clambering over Finn's wonder, and were glad that we could just give Mary a bell and be fetched back into our wonderful adoptive family. |
At the A-V "Experience" financed by the local county government we later learned that this world heritage site would "inspire" us -- the flacks just can't leave a little wonder alone. They also showed us pictures of a peatey ten-foot high local waterfall and urged our visit. Wow! Ten whole feet?
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Although we were sorry to miss one transportation opportunity that passed us by...
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