Water spirit feelings
Springin' round my head
Makes me feel glad
That I'm not dead
The day was dark in the morning, announcing rain. The forecast from yesterday had changed at some point and announced rain too. But I had a plan and a man with a plan is always something to look at. Yesterday I noticed a guy hiring bikes in Ballyvaghan, so I had to try to reach Poulabrone megalithic tomb again. So I just made the as yesterday, but this time I hire a bike- and of course did not went to the cave. Actually I had to go to the cave the day before, as I was very curious about it. It is one of the biggest of the world, and one of the best preserved show cave in Europe. Well, I don’t agree with the new entrance they made for that, and actually got a bit disappointed with the turistic scenary around, but one only can say that after going there – and supposedly paying 17 euro to enter.
Today I was focused in the tomb. In the way is possible to see several standing stones, cairns and megalithic monuments, and most of them are very usual in the landscape. There are dozens of little stone strange combinations, and many of them are with no doubt modern. Some you just can’t tell, and maybe has a much older history. In a bike is not easy to make photos, and everything you carry adds weight and make your journey more and more uneasy. At some point I had to stop and lay down on the floor (ok, it was the most beautiful sight ever), and many times I just jump off the bike and would carry it uphill.
POULABRONE DOLMEN
In about one hour I arrived at Poulabrone, a dolmen like over a cairn, constructed in the stone age, around 3000 BC. Radiocarbone shows that the 30 bodies buried there died around 4200 and 2900 BC. When excavated it was found a baby buried there around 1500 BC, sign that the place been used for ceremonials for a long span of time.
The dolmen is one of the best preserved in Ireland, “if not the best” according with the signs in the place. Like most of the places here in Ireland, Poulabrone is surrounded by a line and you are not allowed to trespass it, and that no doubt vanishes a bit of the emotion of the place, tough tourist herds can actually endanger the monuments.
I probably would not do it better. Anyway is a tiny and beautiful construction. The capstone is a thin rectangular stone about 1.500 kg, supported by 4 stones equally thin and rectangular. It don’t resembles examples like Arthur’s Stone in Wales.
The area surrounding passed through changes, the most dramatic was the loss of soil, for reasons that I can’t imagine, but only guess that the wind must have helped. The vegetation, basically pines simply disappeared, and today the Burren is almost all stone.CAHERCONNEL STONE FORT
From there I went to the Caherconnel stone fort. There are dozens of these stone forts in the Burren, and this is one of the largest. The stone fort is a tradition that comes from the iron age, but been increasing during the early medieval period, when the farms get more elaborate. This barely comprises the time between 500 BC to 1000AD.
Of particular interest, this site has been excavated recently and there was found a body of a young lady buried in the 14th century according with the radiocarbone, but defleshed and with the bones separate like some stone age funerals. If the body was buried at the 14th century, it should have a Christian burial.
To make it more confusing, it was found near her some flints and beads much like in the Neolithic tradition. Quite difficult puzzle to solve. Since dating are expensive and difficult to do, I don’t think we are going to have a quick answer for that. This was the first time I saw a site just excavated (it happened just last year).
It was not possible to find another cairn I was interested, nor the other tomb. I went on the road with the bike and could go through a plain area at last. I must have biked about 5 kilometers. The cairn should be 500ms. Too bad.Despite anything this was a quite pleasant part of the day.
That's when I went downhill back to the bike hiker and the last bus back to town, and that was serious. coming back was fun and beautiful, I seen a falcon or something like that, like floating in front of me. No photos, sorry.
Tomorrow head to Aran islands, where there's a cliff fort I want to go, named "Aengus", which is the name of the god of love.
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