Ireland (Lonely Planet, 9th Edition) - Fionn Davenport [582]
Ballyness Caravan Park & B&B ( 2073 2393; www.ballynesscaravanpark.com; 40 Castlecatt Rd; campervan & caravan sites incl car & 2 persons £20, B&B s/d £35/55; mid-Mar–Oct; ) This ecofriendly caravan park (no tents) is about 1km south of Bushmills town centre on the B66. The farmhouse at the entrance offers B&B accommodation March to October.
Bushmills Inn Hotel ( 2073 2339; www.bushmillsinn.com; 9 Dunluce Rd; s/d from £168/178; ) One of Northern Ireland’s most atmospheric hotels, the Bushmills is an old coaching inn complete with peat fires, gas lamps and a round tower with a secret library. There are no longer any bedrooms in the old part of the hotel – the luxurious accommodation is in the neighbouring, modern Mill House complex.
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THE MAKING OF THE CAUSEWAY
The Mythology
The story goes that the Irish giant, Finn McCool, built the Causeway so he could cross the sea to fight the Scottish giant Benandonner. When he got there he found his rival asleep and, seeing that the Scot was far bigger than he, fled back to Ireland. Soon, Finn’s wife heard the angry Benandonner come running across the Causeway, so she dressed Finn in a baby’s shawl and bonnet and put him in a crib. When the Scottish giant came hammering at Finn’s door, Mrs McCool warned him not to wake Finn’s baby. Taking a glance in the cot, Benandonner decided that if this huge baby was Finn’s child, then McCool himself must be immense, and fled in turn back to Scotland, ripping up the causeway as he went. All that remains are its ends – the Giant’s Causeway in Ireland, and the island of Staffa in Scotland (which has similar rock formations).
The Geology
The more prosaic scientific explanation is that the causeway rocks were formed 60 million years ago, when a thick layer of molten basaltic lava flowed along a valley in the existing chalk beds. As the lava flow cooled and hardened – from the top and bottom surfaces inward – it contracted, creating a pattern of hexagonal cracks at right angles to the cooling surfaces (think of mud contracting and cracking in a hexagonal pattern as a lake bed dries out). As solidification progressed towards the centre of the flow, the cracks spread down from the top, and up from the bottom, until the lava was completely solid. Erosion has cut into the lava flow, and the basalt has split along the contraction cracks, creating the hexagonal columns.
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Copper Kettle ( 2073 2560; 61 Main St; mains £3-6; 8.30am-5pm Mon-Sat, from 10am Sun) This rustic tearoom serves breakfast fry-ups till 11.30am, and has daily lunch specials as well as good tea, coffee, cakes and scones.
Bushmills Inn restaurant (lunch mains £7-12, dinner mains £15-20; noon-9.30pm Mon-Sat & 12.30-9pm Sun) The inn’s excellent restaurant, with intimate wooden booths set in the old 17th-century stables, specialises in fresh Ulster produce and serves everything from sandwiches to full á-la-carte dinners.
Getting There & Away
See Getting There & Around, Click here for transport information.
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GIANT’S CAUSEWAY
When you first see it you’ll understand why the ancients did not think the causeway was a natural feature. The vast expanse of regular, closely packed, hexagonal stone columns dipping gently beneath the waves looks for all the world like the handiwork of giants.
This spectacular rock formation – a national nature reserve and Northern Ireland’s only Unesco World Heritage Site – is one of Ireland’s most impressive and atmospheric landscape features, but it is all too often swamped by visitors – 750,000 of them in 2008. If you can, try to visit midweek or out of season to experience