The path of the giants - where and from where the path of the Giants leads. Giant's Road in Northern Ireland Where is the Giant's Road
Coast Northern Ireland(Great Britain) 3 km from the city of Bushmills is covered with 40 thousand basalt (rarely andesite) columns. This place is called "Giant's Road" (Giant's Path). The road, as well as the Causeway Coast on which it lies, were declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1986. Most of the columns are hexagonal, although some have four, five, seven or eight corners. The tallest column is about 12 meters high.
According to a scientific hypothesis, these bizarre stone pillars were formed 50-60 million years ago, when, during a volcanic eruption, hot and very liquid basalt lava broke through to the surface right in the bed of the then existing river. The outer layers of lava quickly cooled down under the influence of water and formed stone columns, as if driven into the ground (this effect was achieved due to the mass of lava that pressed through the river bottom under it).
Path to the Giant's Trail:
In one of the Celtic myths of the III century AD. it is said that the warrior hero Finn McCumal, who lived in Ireland, was constantly insulted by his neighbor, a one-eyed giant named Goll, who lived across the strait from him (in Scotland). One day, Finn McKumal decided to teach the giant a lesson, and since he could not swim across the bay, he set about building a bridge. For seven days and nights he dragged huge stone rods into the sea, and finally the bridge was ready. Tired after overwork, Finn decided to get a good night's sleep before the upcoming battle. At this time, the Scottish giant, seeing the bridge, ran across it to Ireland and began to knock on the door to the warrior. The warrior's wife was frightened and came up with a trick: she swaddled him like a baby. In addition, she treated Goll with cakes, inside of which she baked flat iron pans, and when the giant began to break his teeth about them, she gave the second cake, a simple one, to the “baby” Finn, who calmly ate it. Having imagined what a giant the father of this rather big “baby” would be, Goll fled in horror, destroying the bridge along the way. Therefore, only the beginning of the bridge, extending into the sea, has survived to this day:
The Road of the Giants is about 40,000 closely spaced basalt pillars on the northeast coast of Northern Ireland. Their tops, like cobblestones of the pavement, lead in ledges from the foot of the coastal cliffs and gradually disappear into the sea. Most of the pillars are in some incomprehensible way shaped like almost perfect hexagons. They, like parts of a giant stone puzzle, stretch along the seashore for three kilometers.
For a decade and a half, the Road of the Giants has resisted the unbridled storms of the North Atlantic here. For many centuries, the strange regularity of its stone columns forced local shepherds and fishermen to write legends about it. They came up with their own story of its origin long before this secret was truly revealed by science.
Giant ethnic conflict
According to legend, the pillars that go into the sea are the remains of a road built by the Irish giant Finn McCool. He decided to build it after he was challenged to battle by a giant from Scotland named Benandonner.
To get to the rival who lived overseas, McCool began to tear off huge stones from the coastal rocks and throw them into the sea. So there was a 25-mile road leading to the lair of Benandonner - a cave on the Scottish island of Staffa. Now Fin could cross the Northern Strait along it and teach the insolent a lesson.
However, the construction of the road tired him so much that he decided to rest first - he returned home and went to bed.
The next morning, while Fin McCool was still fast asleep, his giantess wife was awakened by the sound of menacing footsteps. It was the huge and terrible Benandonner who had managed to use the new road first. Seeing him, she thought: “My husband will never be able to cope with this,” and quickly threw a blanket and a baby cap over the sleeping man.
Where is Fin? bellowed Benandonner as he approached their house. Where is this coward hiding?
"Be quiet, you'll wake up our baby!" - answered the wife, pointing to the sleeping spouse.
Benandonner glanced at the "child" and immediately panicked. If the son of Fin was so big, what then would his father be? The Scot decided not to find out, and hastily retreated to his cave. Along the way, he destroyed the road built by Fin so that he could not catch up with him.
Legendary riddles and scientific clues
The legendary Fin McCool built his road to the small island of Staffa for a reason. Folk lore chose this tiny piece of land because it is made up of the same basalt pillars as the Northern Irish Giant's Causeway. The external similarity of the two places gave rise to a single explanatory myth.
Interestingly, from a scientific point of view, the basalt columns of Staffa and the Road of the Giants do have a common origin. It, of course, has nothing to do with the "disassembly" of the legendary giants, and is due to the unity of their geological history.
Basalt pillars Giants' roads descend from the foot of the coastal hills and disappear into the sea.
The scientific world first learned about the Giant's Causeway in 1693, when Sir Richard Bulkley of Trinity College Dublin reported it to the Royal Society of London. The news caused considerable confusion in the educated circles of that time. This was the first time that science had dealt with basalt pillars, and heated debate began to be waged over the reasons for their appearance. Some considered the Giant's Road to be the creation of human hands, others - the result of unknown natural processes, and some even seriously leaned towards the "giant" theory.
The first correct idea about the origin of the Road appeared on the pages of the scientific press in 1768 in one of the volumes of illustrations for the landmark French Encyclopedia. As a commentary on the engraving depicting her, the French geologist Nicolas Desmarets (1725 - 1815) suggested a volcanic reason for her appearance. More recent research has proven him right.
The real story of the Road of the Giants
Today it is known that the Road of the Giants originated about 60 million years ago, when the separation of Europe and North America began.
At that time, as a result of the divergence of the Eurasian and North American lithospheric plates, ruptures began to form in the earth's crust, through which basalt lava repeatedly poured onto the surface. Freezing, it formed a huge lava Tulean plateau, the area of \u200b\u200bwhich scientists estimate at least 1.3 million km2.
Subsequently, it was torn apart and hidden by the waters of the North Atlantic Ocean. Today, its remnants are scattered over vast expanses from Norway, Scotland and Ireland to the Faroe Islands, Iceland and eastern Greenland. The Causeway of the Giants and the basalt pillars of Staffa Island are the most famous results of its formation.
In total, three phases of volcanic activity were noted in the area of the Giant's Road during the emergence of the Tulean Plateau. They are known as the lower, middle, and upper basalts and are separated by two long periods of relative calm, when the surface of the erupted and solidified lava was eroded. The erosion of the oldest, lower basalt layer created the conditions for the formation of the Road.
During the first of these "erosive" periods, water flows cut through numerous valleys in the lower basalts. Later, when the lava of the middle basalts erupted, its huge masses accumulated in these valleys and began to cool very slowly there. It was the low cooling rate that became the key factor in the appearance of the stone pillars of the Giant's Road.
The road of giants going into the sea. The same basalt pillars are located on the Scottish island of Staffa on the other side of the North Channel. As scientists have found out, shrinking during slow cooling, basalt begins to crack. In most cases, cracks form at an angle of 120°, since this releases the largest amount of excess surface energy at the interfaces. This is how hexagonal horizontal sections of future basalt pillars are formed.
As it cools, the cracks move from the surface deep into the massif. Their length depends on the thickness of the basalt layer: the thicker it is, the longer the pillars form. The highest height of the columns of the Giant's Road is 12 meters, and this is far from a record. In exceptional cases, as, for example, in the US state of Wyoming, they can reach a hundred or even more meters in height.
The thickness of the columns is also mainly determined by the cooling rate: the lower it is, the larger the diameter of the columns appear. The average thickness of the pillars of the Giant's Road is 30 cm.
Approximately two million years after the formation of the pillars, new eruptions occurred in the area of the future Giant's Road. Their result - a layer of upper basalts - was not massive enough to give rise to their own stone columns, but it was quite enough to hide the existing ones for a long time.
The hexagon is the most common sectional shape of basalt pillars, since the angle between its adjacent sides is exactly 120°. Columns with a different number of faces are formed less frequently. Glaciers helped to see the light of the future Road of the Giants again. During the last glacial maximum, they "scraped off" the later geological layers that covered it and exposed the basalt pillars. Then, when the glacier began to recede about 15,000 years ago, the ocean level rose, and the Giant's Road took on its present form.
world heritage site
Since the Giant's Road is an exemplary example of processes related to the geological evolution of the Earth, and at the same time is also associated with the cultural heritage of Northern Ireland, it is protected by numerous protected statuses.
The most significant of these is the UNESCO World Heritage status awarded to the Giant's Causeway and adjacent Causeway Coast in November 1986. In addition, the Road, along with the coast, is a state reserve, and is also part of one of the so-called "areas of special scientific interest."
On the Road to the Road
Over the past 300 years, the Giant's Road has become one of the symbols of Northern Ireland and its most popular tourist attraction. The first tourists began to appear here almost immediately after the "discovery" of Sir Bulkley. In the 19th century, their flow became massive, especially after the construction in the 1880s of a hydroelectric tram line that connected the Road with the resort town of Portrush.
Today, on the Road of the Giants, a huge number of tourists click the shutters of their cameras every year. In 2014 alone, 788 thousand visitors from all over the world visited here.
Getting to the famous basalt pillars is not difficult. Giants Road is located in County Antrim, 3.2 km from the village of Bushmills. A trip here by private car from Belfast takes 1 hour 25 minutes, from Derry - 1 hour 10 minutes, from Dublin - 3 hours 45 minutes.
You can use public transport: Take the train from Belfast or Derry to Coleraine. Further - 17.7 km by bus.
Another close-up of the basalt pillars of the Giant's Road. The Causeway Coast is open all year round with no time limit. Four convenient hiking trails lead to the faceted pillars from the official entrance. A walk along them, as well as along the coast itself, is free. If you wish, you can pay for a triple additional service: a visit to the new tourist center (opened in July 2012), an audio guide in 9 languages (including Russian) and a booklet diagram.
For many centuries, the rough symmetry of the basalt pillars of the Giant's Road has never ceased to intrigue and inspire visitors. Walking along it is like traveling back in time. Its steps lead simultaneously to the creative cataclysms of a million-year past, and to the foggy legends of Irish antiquity. Without a visit here, no trip to Northern Ireland can be considered complete.
River bent in an arc
At first glance at this sharp bend in the Colorado River in northern Arizona, USA, it becomes clear where its name comes from - the Horseshoe. With its almost perfectly symmetrical 270 degrees of turn, this river meander really looks like a horse's "shoes". The unusual shape, picturesque cliffs over 300 meters high and comparative accessibility have made the Horseshoe an extremely popular tourist attraction. Today, it is one of the most recognizable and frequently photographed natural landmarks in the Southwest United States of America.
How to bend an entire river into an arc
According to geologists, the Arizona Horseshoe arose about 5 million years ago, when, as a result of the tectonic uplift of the Colorado Plateau, the ancient Colorado River on the border of the future states of Arizona and Utah was forced to adapt to the new terrain. Following faults in local sandstone massifs, she gradually carved a whole canyon into them. Today it is known as the Glen, and the Horseshoe is its most intricately curved section.
The color of the rocks and water at the Horseshoe changes throughout the day. Some of the best shots are taken at sunset. In 1963, the canyon was almost completely flooded by the huge Powell Reservoir. It retained its original appearance only in the southernmost part, about 24 km long (where, in fact, the Horseshoe is located).
By the way, Glen is the northern neighbor of the famous Grand Canyon, which has a very similar geological history.
Easily accessible beauty
Horseshoe is one of those few phenomenally beautiful places that travelers with almost any physical ability can reach. It is located just 6.5 km southwest of the Arizona town of Page, from which the 89th highway leads to the bend. A dirt road turns from it between milestones No. 544 and No. 545, and then almost immediately there is a special parking lot and the beginning of a hiking trail. A short ascent to a small pavilion on a hill, then a gentle descent - and a mighty bend of the Horseshoe opens before your eyes.
In general, a walk there and back, a distance of about a couple of kilometers, takes about 45 minutes.
You can go to the Horseshoe all year round, permits and separate tickets to visit it are not required. You will only have to pay for access to the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, on whose territory the Horseshoe is located. Access costs $25 from a private car and is valid for up to seven days.
IN National zone recreation, it is forbidden to litter, as well as to violate wildlife in any way and leave inscriptions. You can walk dogs on a short leash (no longer than 1.8 m).
Going to the Horseshoe, it is recommended to take plenty of water with you (at least 1 liter per person), as well as sunglasses and a hat, because there is no shade on the path except for the gazebo halfway. For those who are fond of photography, a wide-angle lens is mandatory - without it, the scale of the Horseshoe simply cannot be covered. Of course, you should be careful on the observation deck - there are no railings and fences on it.
The height above sea level at the observation deck of the Horseshoe is 1285 m. The height above the Colorado River is just over 300 m. There are no fences, so you need to be careful. In July 2010, a Greek tourist fell and died here. In terms of the beauty of the landscape best time to visit the Horseshoe - from about 9:30 in the morning (when the river gets rid of a thick shadow) until noon. At noon itself, due to the lack of shadows, the view of the famous bend will be somewhat flat. Evening until sunset, inclusive, is also a good option, but in this case the sun will shine in the eyes.
In relative proximity to the Horseshoe, there are several other first-class attractions at once. So, directly north of Page is the imposing wall of the Glen Canyon Dam, 220 meters high, beyond which the Powell Reservoir begins. 45 km west of the Horseshoe lies the famous Arizona Wave - a sandstone rock formation of absolutely incredible beauty. And 12 km in the opposite direction (that is, to the east) is the equally famous Antelope Canyon.
And finally, southwest of the bend downstream of the Colorado River begins the Grand Canyon - one of the most unusual and impressive geological features of the globe.
Remarkable freshman
At the top of one of the taiga-covered mountain ranges of the Gremyachinsky district of the Perm Territory, there is a powerful rock mass cut up by deep cracks. Crossing it crosswise, large and not very clefts form a bizarre labyrinth, reminiscent of the streets, alleys and squares of some long abandoned settlement. This is the so-called Stone Town, one of the most popular tourist destinations of the modern Prikamye.
Three names for one place
Today Stone Town is widely known not only to Permians, but also to many guests of the region. Here, despite the remoteness, a constant flow of travelers stretches all year round. However, this was not always the case: a couple of decades ago, only a few local residents knew about Stone Town, and even then under completely different names.
Cracks in the rock mass of the Stone Town form a network of large and small "streets". The fact is that modern tourists have already called this place Stone Town, and earlier for half a century it was called "Turtles". This name was given to it in the middle of the 20th century due to the characteristic shape of the two highest remnant rocks by residents of the neighboring mining villages of Shumikhinsky and Yubileiny, founded in 1953 and 1957, respectively. However, this name was not original either: the old-timers of the most “age” settlement of these places - the village of Usva - have long known these rocky outcrops as the Devil's Settlement.
Such a name is not uncommon for the Ural toponymy. Not far from Yekaterinburg, for example, there is a spectacular mountain of the same name, very popular with tourists and rock climbers. In addition, objects with a similar name are also found in other regions of Russia, since rocky massifs and unusually shaped stone ridges were usually called devilish settlements. Obviously, people, not knowing the true geological reasons, attributed their construction to evil spirits.
History of appearance
How did the Permian Stone Town actually arise?
Scientists have established that 350 - 300 million years ago there was a large river delta in this place. Its mighty streams brought with them large masses of sand, which eventually turned into powerful sandstone deposits. Later, as a result of the movement of tectonic plates that caused the formation Ural mountains, the territory of the future Stone Town turned out to be raised high above sea level and began to undergo weathering.
Quartz sandstone of the Stone Town. The brown color is due to the admixture of iron hydroxides. Over long millions of years, water, wind, temperature changes and chemical processes have deepened and expanded the cracks in the rock that appeared during the tectonic uplift. This led to the emergence of the current "streets" and "lanes", which at the moment can be up to eight meters wide and twelve meters deep. In other words, from a scientific point of view, the Permian Stone City is an accumulation of weathering remnants composed of fine-grained quartz sandstones.
Road to Stone Town
Given today's great popularity of the Stone Town, it is hard to believe that it is not even mentioned in the old guidebooks around the Kama region. Nevertheless, this is true - the rush demand for the Gremyachinsky remains appeared among Perm travel enthusiasts only in the last one and a half to two decades, and before that, due to poor transport accessibility, they were practically unknown to the mass tourist.
Fortunately, the situation has changed since then, and today Stone Town can be easily reached by car. The general route is as follows: first, the road to Usva (188 kilometers from Perm, 383 from Yekaterinburg), then about two more kilometers along the highway towards Kizel. Then turn right to the villages of Shumikhinsky and Yubileiny and five kilometers along the forest dirt road to the car park. Further, turning left from the road, about a kilometer and a half march along a well-marked path and among the trees the first remnants of the Stone Town will begin to be seen.
At the top of the Rudyansky spoy
Since the Stone Town is located near the main peak of the Rudyansky spoy mountain range (526 meters above sea level), the path from the dirt road to the remains goes up a small slope. The ridge begins on the outskirts of the village of Usva and stretches 19 kilometers north to the city of Gubakha. It was named Rudyansky because of the Rudyanka river flowing in its southern part, in the basin of which iron ore was mined at the beginning of the 19th century. Spoils in the Perm Territory used to be called forest-covered long mountain ranges without pronounced peaks.
The rocky outlier Turtle is the main symbol of the Permian Stone Town. The stone city (not counting the numerous single stones scattered around it) is divided into two unequal parts. The first rock outcrops that tourists go to belong to the so-called Big City. It is in it that the two largest local remnants rise - the Big and Small Turtles, because of which the Devil's Settlement changed its name in the 1950s.
The smaller of these remnants, due to its similarity in shape to a perched bird, is today better known to tourists as the Feathered Guardian. The larger one, accordingly, is now more commonly referred to simply as the Turtle. Between him and the Feathered Guard there is a vast and almost horizontal platform - the so-called Square. Tourists get to it along the Prospekt - the widest (up to four meters) and the longest crack in the Stone Town. The almost sheer walls of the Prospect in places reach eight meters in height.
The feathered guardian, as well as the Turtle seen behind him, often becomes the object of annual rock climbing competitions held in the Stone City between rescuers of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, mountain tourists and speleologists of the Perm Territory. To the right and to the left of the Prospect narrow cracks-streets depart. One of them (the one that goes around the Turtle) has the highest - up to 12 meters - walls in the city. On the other two, you can climb above the rock massif and from there, in all its glory, you can see both the Stone Guard and the Turtle in front of you.
About 150 meters north of the Bolshoy is the Small Town. Despite a much smaller area compared to its neighbor, it is also very interesting and picturesque. Its main "street", for example, is even more spectacular than the Prospect described above. In addition, there is a curious stone ridge with a through hole in the base. The only problem is that there is no clear path to the Small Town, and it is not always easy to find.
You can come to Stone Town at any time of the year, but it is especially beautiful here on sunny autumn days. At this time, you can wander endlessly through its streets immersed in bright colors. That is why at the end of August and at the beginning of autumn in the Stone Town there is the largest influx of visitors.
However, many tourists come here in winter, when both the remnants themselves and the trees growing right on them are effectively covered with snow-white caps of snowdrifts. Therefore, going to the Stone Town in the winter months, you should not be afraid that the local paths will be impassable due to deep snow. They will certainly be well trodden by groups of previous visitors.
Stone Town is located immediately to the west of the main peak of the Rudyansky spoy ridge. From here, unforgettable views of the boundless ocean of the Ural taiga open up. Before visiting the Stone Town, you need to stock up on water, as there are no large water sources in it. Also, since since 2008 this landscape natural monument of regional significance has received the status of a specially protected natural area, certain rules of conduct should be followed.
Firstly, it is possible to make fires in the Stone Town only in specially equipped places, using only dead wood and deadwood for this (it is forbidden to cut down living trees and shrubs). Secondly, you can not litter and leave unextinguished fires behind. Thirdly, it is forbidden to disturb animals and make inscriptions on rocks, stones and trees. Violation of these rules threatens with a fine of up to 500 thousand rubles.
Stone Town is not the only natural attraction in the vicinity of Usva village. Not far from it is, for example, such a "flagship" of the tourism industry of the Perm Territory as the Usva Pillars - a huge and extremely photogenic stone ridge with a picturesque remnant of the Devil's Finger. Rafting on the Usva River is also very popular among Permians.
In general, weathering remnants similar to Stone Town associated with selective destruction mountain ranges, are one of the most spectacular geomorphological objects of the Kama region. There are especially many of them on the flat peaks of the Northern Urals, such as the Chuvalsky stone, Kuryksar, Larch ridges and on the Kvarkush plateau.
The road of giants stretches along the coast for 275 m, in addition, it enters the sea for 150 m. Geologists determine the age of the columns at 60 million years! Despite this, they are in excellent condition, practically not destroyed and still delight the tourists who come here with the splendor.
Here you can see picturesque caves, some can be viewed from land, others - only from the sea, visit ruined castles and lovely sandy coves. The 13th-century Dunluce Castle stands on a cliff connected to the mainland by a bridge over a precipice at the bottom of which the sea laps. Dunseverick Castle is an earlier fortification to the east of the Giant's Road, and to the east stands the 16th-century castle of Keenbane Castle. In the summer, you can get here every day by cruise boat to Rathlin Island, five miles from Billy Castle. The most interesting place here is Bryus's Cave, where in 1306 Robert the Bruce, King of Scotland, who was watching the spider weaving its web again, had the idea to win back his kingdom and become the ruler again.
The legend of the origin of stone prisms
According to an ancient Celtic legend, stone prisms on the coast of the Irish coast were built by a fairy-tale hero, the giant Finn Mac Cummal. Once he wanted to measure his strength with the one-eyed Gol, who lives on the island of Staffa, located on the other side of the strait. To his regret, Finn McKummal was very afraid of water, and he did not find a suitable means by which to swim across the water. Then he decided to build a road across the sea straight to the island of Staffa. He paved it for 7 days, dragging faceted columns, planting them deep into the ground and pressing tightly against each other so that they would not sag under the weight of his body.
Upon completion of the construction, the giant was very tired and decided to rest before a difficult battle. At this time, the Cyclops noticed a stone bridge, out of nowhere, taken in the middle of the sea. He sensed the danger and decided to attack his enemy first. After crossing the bridge, he found a dwelling and began to break on the door. Not good enough for Finn McKummal, if not for the resourcefulness of his wife. She wrapped her husband in a sheet and only after that launched the Cyclops into the house. To the angry cries, the woman calmly replied that the owner was not at home, and their son was sleeping in the cradle. Gol was seriously frightened when he saw the size of the child and imagined the growth of his father. He fled in horror from the island, destroying the built bridge behind him so that the enemy would not overtake him.
ancient building
Some researchers believe that the Irish columns are the creation of ancient people. After all, such a building is not the only one of its kind. It can be compared to Hadrian's Wall, a magnificent Roman monument built in the 2nd century AD. In Great Britain. It was 130 km long, 5 km high and 6 km wide. Similar to both of these buildings and the famous Stonehenge in England, which was made of huge boulders 5,000 years ago.
At the bottom Pacific Ocean scientists have discovered an entire city that has disappeared, built mainly from hewn hexagonal slabs that look very much like Irish columns.
From the foregoing, it follows that technically, people of antiquity had the opportunity to build stone structures of impressive size.
Scientists' opinion
Scientists explain the Irish miracle very simply. Millions of years ago, the magma formed after volcanic eruptions began to solidify. When such processes occur on the sea coast, the magma layer from above breaks up into geometrically regular hexagons. The crystallization process then deepens inward and gives rise to faceted basalt columns. Here is a common explanation for one of the most seemingly mysterious structures of our century.
Some time ago, the "Giant's Road" was recognized as the fourth wonder of the world in the UK (according to the Times newspaper). These ancient formations are protected by UNESCO and belong to the National Fund.
Facts about the Road of the Giants
- Time of formation: The Giants' Road appeared about 60 million years ago.
- Number of basalt columns: About 40,000.
- Height and dimensions: The highest -12m, the widest -25m thick.
- Attractions: Chimneys, Giant's Organ. Giant's Flute, Giant's Boot, and Shepherd's Ladder.
The Giant's Trail is located on the northern coast of Ireland, 100 km northwest of Belfast, about 3 km north of Bushmills and is famous for its unique landscape.
A lot of stone pillars standing nearby form a semblance of a road that seems to be paved with unusual paving stones. There are many variations of the legend about the origin of the Giant's Path, and we will tell you one of them.
A long time ago, when giants lived on Earth, the giant Fin McCool, who lives in these parts, wanted to measure his strength with the giant Benandonner and challenged him to battle. The vain Benandonner accepted the challenge, wanting to teach the impudent Fin a lesson and got ready to go.
The rivals were separated by the sea, and in order to be in the possessions of Fin, Benandonner began to drive huge pillars into the seabed, creating a semblance of a bridge. He spent a lot of time and effort, but still got to the other side and decided to take a nap before the upcoming fight.
Finn's wife McCool was walking along the waterfront when she suddenly noticed the sleeping Benandonner. Assessing that her husband's rival is bigger and stronger, she decided to go for a trick and swaddled her giant husband like a baby.
When Benandonner came to their house and saw such a “child”, he was seriously frightened: after all, if this is just a child, then what a powerful father he has ?! And Benandonner had no choice but to flee back to his lands, destroying the bridge of columns along the way.
The origin of the Path of the Giants was able to explain not only local legends, but also scientists. According to them, the abnormally symmetrical pillars formed during a volcanic eruption more than 50 million years ago. As a result of chemical reactions, pressure and layering, the lava turned into regular hexagons, which we can contemplate at the present time.
Another attraction of the Giants' Trail is the so-called "chimneys". Under the influence of erosion and weathering, some pillars began to rise above the rest and from the side resemble the chimneys of an old castle. The Spanish warship "Girona", escaping after the defeat of the "Invincible Armada" in 1588, fired several volleys of cannons at the cliff, as the Spaniards mistook it for an enemy castle.
This picturesque place inspired creative people of the 19th century: artists, writers and even musicians. The naturalist Joseph Banks, who visited the Giant's Trail more than once, once said: “Compared to this, what are the cathedrals and palaces built by man? Just toy houses."
Video - Giant's Path
About 40 thousand huge stone columns are so closely adjacent to each other that it seems that some giant, the hero of Irish myths and legends, installed them here. The diameter of these pillars is from 30 to 50 centimeters, they have even tops and several faces (a quarter has five, the rest has four, seven and even nine corners). The Path of the Giants (or, as it is also called, the Road of the Giants) is located in Northern Ireland, not far from the small town of Bushmills. It encircles the cliffs that are located on the coast of the Causeway Coast, and then gradually goes under water towards Scotland.
The scale of this amazing place is amazing. If you look at the Road of the Giants from above, then it really is extremely similar to a stone-paved road that stretches along the coast for 275 meters and goes into the Atlantic for another one and a half hundred meters.
The average height of the pillars is about six meters, although it is not uncommon to see columns twelve high. If you look at them from above, they are somewhat reminiscent of a honeycomb, since they organize hexagons among themselves, so tightly located in relation to each other that it is quite difficult to insert even a thin knife between them.
Absolutely all the pillars are dark in color and incredibly hard - scientists explain this natural phenomenon by the fact that they consist mainly of basalt rich in magnesium and iron, which at the same time has a small amount of quartz. Thanks to this composition, the columns are able to successfully withstand the destructive effects of the winds and rough waves of the Atlantic Ocean.
The columns of the Giants' Causeway in Ireland form three groups of sites:
- Big trail. The columns of this group are the largest and begin near the rocky mountains. At first they look like a cluster of huge stone steps, some of which reach up to six meters in height. Closer to the water, the steps gradually level off until they begin to form a stone-covered road, which is 20 to 30 meters wide.
- Middle and Small trails. The pillars of these groups are located near the Great Path and, in shape, are more likely not like a road, but like barrows. Since each such column has a flat top, it is possible to carefully (especially near the water, because there they are extremely wet and slippery) to move from one column to another.
- Staffa Island. At 130 km from the coast there is a small uninhabited island of Staffa (in translation - "island of pillars"), on which there is, as it were, a continuation of these columns. Between these pillars is the main attraction of the island - a huge Fingal cave, which is about 80 meters long.
cliffs
The columns themselves on the Causeway Coast are located around the cliffs, which people later gave rather original names. For example, two of them were named after the Harp (the columns from this cliff descend to the coast in a curved line) and the Organ (the straight and high pillars that are located near it are very reminiscent of this musical instrument).
There are cliffs with such interesting names as the Giant's Loom, the Giant's Coffin, the Giant's Cannons, the Giant's Eyes. Here you can also look at the Giant's Shoe - a two-meter cobblestone that resembles these shoes (it was even calculated that the giant who wore such a product must be at least 16 meters tall).
Chimneys of Giant's Path
There is one more interesting place on the Giant's Road - Chimneys, which several centuries ago frightened the already defeated "Invincible Armada".
It happened for a simple reason. Some pillars of the Giant's Road in Ireland not only rise on the coast, but also look like the chimneys of a huge castle from the sea. The Spaniards confused him with him, and fired cannons at “enemy territory” - that is, an absolutely deserted territory.
This story ended badly for the Spaniards: their ship crashed against the rocks, and many people died. The treasures found from the ship, after they were raised from the bottom of the sea, can now be seen in the Ulster Museum, which is located in Belfast.
Legend
There is nothing surprising in the fact that the Giant's Road has its own legends and myths that explain its appearance and formation.
The ancient Irish believed that the Giant's Road was built by the Irish giant Finn McCool in order to get to his sworn enemy, the Scotsman, who lived in the Hebrides, and fight him in order to decide who was stronger.
Further versions are slightly different from each other. According to one of them, seeing that his opponent is bigger and more powerful than him, Finn ran away. And when he saw that the Scot was chasing him, he persuaded his wife to swaddle him like a child and leave him to sleep on the shore. According to another version, while the Irishman was building the road, he was so tired that he fell asleep on the coast, and his wife, seeing that the rival was approaching, swaddled him and passed him off as a child.
In any case, seeing a huge "baby", the Scottish giant decided that it was better not to mess with his father and gave up, and so that the Irishman would not catch up with him, he destroyed the path.
Studying
Interestingly, the Road of the Giants became widely known only at the end of the 17th century, when the Bishop of Derry began to heavily advertise this amazing place. And at the beginning of the 19th century, tourists began to appear en masse here.
Despite the fact that this area is declared by the Department of the Environment of Northern Ireland national reserve, there are absolutely no areas closed to the public, and tourists can walk wherever they want and where they can go. This fact is quite liked by tourists in this country.
The Road of the Giants is unique in that, despite the fact that something similar exists in other parts of the world, it is here that the largest concentration of such pillars is located. There is nothing surprising in the fact that for many centuries scientists have debated how exactly the Path arose.
Some of them assured that the giant pillars are actually huge crystals that arose a long time ago at the bottom of the ancient sea. Others said that the pillars are actually a petrified bamboo forest.
In our time, most scientists agreed that the largest lava plain in Europe once existed here. It was formed thanks to a huge layer of limestone, which is located under the territory of Northern Ireland. In ancient times, molten lava flowed out through its faults during volcanic eruptions, which covered the earth with a layer of 180 meters, after which it began to cool and harden. And it didn’t become a shapeless mass because it was based on basalt.
After some time, during cooling, the lava began to slowly decrease in volume, and thanks to the basalt, hexagonal cracks formed on its surface. When the inner layers of magma began to cool, these cracks began to deepen and formed hexagonal columns.
This theory was confirmed by a group of scientists from Toronto, who, after experiments, were able to prove that the slower the magma cools, the larger the columns are. Thus, the secret of the appearance of such an amazing natural phenomenon how Ireland's Giant's Trail was uncovered... or not?