Choose Ireland » Caves

Mitchelstown Cave

Brian — Mon, 13 Nov 2006 10:49:51 +0000

Located just east of Mitchelstown, this multi-cavern natural wonder is considered one of the most dramatic in all of Europe. It features stalactites and stalagmites, huge drip stone formations, and many fine columns, including a famous 30-foot high formation known as the Tower of Babel.
A guided tour winds its way through two caverns, called House of Lords and House of Commons, for a distance of nearly a half-mile. The columns, stalactites and stalagmites are created when limestone dissolved in rainwater accumulates inside the caves when the water evaporates. The process takes more than a thousand years to result in a complete formation.
The caves, discovered inadvertently by Michael Condon in 1833 as he quarried limestone, were on the property purchased by Timothy Mulcahy in 1875. The family has worked to preserve them ever since. The caverns have been lit electrically since 1972, and are accessible to the public daily.
Along the guided tour, visitors can see fossils reportedly 350 million years old, along with various plants native to the caverns.

Tollymore Forest Park

Brian — Wed, 26 Jul 2006 09:20:10 +0000

The first state forest to be granted Forest Park status in Northern Ireland, Tollymore Forest Park celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2005.
This attractive park features the whimsical designs of Thomas Wright (1711-1786). It contains caves, bridges, and grottoes, some natural and some man made. The Gothic gate near the entrance was part of the original estate owned by Lord Clanbrassil.
The forest is full of traditional growth as well as exotic surprises such as the monkey-puzzle tree, huge redwoods and unusual pines. White Star Lines, builder of the Titanic, regularly used oak wood from Tollymore to erect their ocean liners. The arboretum at Tollymore features the oldest tree in any Irish arboretum, the Clanabrassilian, dating back to around 1750.
There are four walking trails used to see the sights of Tollymore Forest Park:
The Arboretum and Forest Plots Trail leads to a wide variety of species and affords visitors a close up view.
The Lakes and Ponds trail winds along the Shimna River, which flows through the park, to the lake via Old Bridge. It then passes streams and several old millponds before circling back to the river.
The Rivers Trail follows the Shimna River past Parnell’s Bridge to the Spinkwee River with its beautiful Cascade Falls, a 10-meter waterfall and one of the park’s most engaging features.
The Long Haul Trail is a more difficult hiking trail that progresses through deep forest and mountain, rewarding climbers with spectacular views of the Mourne Mountains and the seacoast below.
In 1611, the Maginnes family received the lands around Tollymore as a grant from James I. They were passed on to the Hamiltons in 1685 and then to the Roden family who sold the land to the Ministry of Agriculture in 1941.

Dunmore Cave

Michael Heraghty — Thu, 13 Oct 2005 17:17:42 +0000

This unique and interesting series of caverns in the limestone hills near Kilkenny City was designated as a national monument in 1940, but has been known to man since at least the 9th century and formed over a period of perhaps millions of years. It stands on Castlecomer plateau above the Dinin River Valley and contains some of the largest and most widely recognized calcite formations in all of Europe and certainly in all of Ireland.
To fully experience Dunmore Cave, a guided tour is available and highly recommended. The tour will take you down 706 steep stairs to the three main chambers of the cave, and there are many other smaller chambers to explore. The caverns contain evidence of nearly 3,500 years of inhabitants. Amid the stalagmites and stalactites, you’ll see the huge dripstone known as the Market Cross, which is 21 feet tall and the largest formation of its kind in all of Europe. The chamber that surrounds the Market Cross is known as the Town Hall, and its calcite walls are a brilliant, snowy white.
As you descend beneath the surface of the earth and enter the cave, you’ll notice the gradual decline in vegetation due to the growing darkness below. The cave did, at one point, support bat life in the form of a huge colony, but now all that is visible are the calcified skeleton bats of the past.
The chronicles of the rich history of Dunmore cave begin in the Irish annals in the early 9th century, with the story of massive Viking raids that took many of the lives of the people hiding within the cave. It was called ‘Dearc Fearna’, or Cave of the Alders” and described as a fearful dark place likened to a huge beast.
Today’s visitors benefit from the large interpretive center that tells the history of the cave using interactive exhibits that feature treasures and remains discovered within, including the gruesome discovery of the remains of 44 women and children who may have suffocated during the Viking massacre of 928 A.D.
In 1999, a treasure trove of Viking coins and jewelry were found and displayed at the National Museum in Dublin.

Brittas Bay

Michael Heraghty — Tue, 09 Aug 2005 10:48:54 +0000

Day tourists from Dublin enjoy visiting the coastline at Brittas Bay, 40 minutes drive south from the city, just four kilometres off the N11 motorway. The Bay it meanders through coves, rocky areas and caves, interspersed with stretches of bright, soft and sandy beach perfect for swimming and walking.
Be sure to visit Silver Strand, a popular and swimming area at the foot of a sloping hillside. The Strand has consistently been ranked as “Blue Flag” – awarded only to European beaches of the highest quality – by the EU. And don’t forget your camera – the surrounding dunes are rich with a variety of native coastal wildlife.

Marble Arch Caves

Michael Heraghty — Tue, 12 Oct 2004 12:27:41 +0000

First explored by E.A. Martel in 1895, the Marble Arch Cave complex at Florencecourt Co. Fermanagh are situated in a National Nature Reserve, and are considered to be among the best visitor-friendly caves in Europe.
Visitors can explore a fascinating, natural underworld of rivers, waterfalls, stalagmites and stalactites, winding passages and lofty chambers.
The “wet entrance” to the cave, taken by those on guided tours, is via the subterranean Claddagh River, into the Grand Gallery, where the cave is explored on foot. While this narrow part of the cave was inaccessible to Martel, an artificial tunnel now connects it to the New Chamber, and to the rest of the cave complex, which leads out onto the Owenbrean river, via which the visitor exits.
The water in this karst limestone area is regulated by the vegetation, and permeated the rock over time to create its various fissures, streams and caves. The Cuilcagh Mountain above the caves was originally covered with blanket peatland bogs, but in the last century commercial peat cutting, sheep over-grazing, and uncontrolled burning of vegetation have destroyed huge areas of this natural water reservoir.
To counteract this environmental damage, and to keep excessive water out of the caves, the Fermanagh District Council created the Cuilagh Moutain Park, were peat cutting was banned and 1200 small dams were created to build up the water levels in the bog.
The Cuilcagh Mountain Park was set up by the Fermanagh District Council in 1998. Peat cutting was stopped and more than 1200 small dams were put into the drains to build up the water levels in the bog, while a weir upstream of the Marble Arch caves also holds water back.

The Burren

Michael Heraghty — Wed, 06 Oct 2004 10:43:17 +0000

The Burren, an area of about 100 square miles of karstic limestone rock and sparse soil on a dramatically undulating landscape, lies in the north-west corner of county Clare. Bordered on the west by the Atlantic Ocean, with Galway Bay to the northwest, the Burren gets its name from the Irish (Gaelic) word Boireann, meaning rocky place.
Created by glacial action during the last ice age, the Burren is a wilderness that is at times flat and sloping, and other times broken by great hillsides of limestone separated by imposing cliffs, containing tranquil valleys, peacefully meandering streams, and beautiful beaches.
With a bleak but beautiful appearance often described as “lunar”, the Burren holds many delightful secrets – such as underground rivers and lakes, caverns and chambers, created over the centuries by rainwater which permeated. One such chamber, open to the public, is called Aillwee cave.
The ancient Irish were just as fond of the Burren as are its modern day visitors, as evidenced in its many archaeological sites, including some of Europe’s finest examples of megalithic tombs. Other monuments, dolmens and burial chambers date back almost 6000 years (older than the Egyptian pyramids!).
The most famous is the vortal tomb, or portal dolman, at Poulnabrone, an area that contains more than 60 wedge tombs. There are also numerous examples of raths (earthen ring forts) and stone cashels.
The area is also rich in ancient monasteries, churches and other ecclesiastical sites, as the Irish have long associated the Burren with spiritual peace
The Burren also boasts an extraordinary array of flora and wildlife, as the complex and unique environment provides home for plants and flowers not normally found together in the same location, as well as many unusual and rare species. Among these are the Alpine Gentian, Bloody Cranesbill, Mountain Avens. Strangely, some of the plants growing in the area are traditionally considered lime-hating.
For these and other reasons, the Burren is a botanist’s and ecologist’s paradise.