I think I’ve just found the most magical place in Northern Ireland.
Located on a small piece of the Antrim coast and tucked away beneath green and grassy hills, giant Balsalt columns ranging in color from smoky white to jet black thrust up from the ground in a series of interlocking hexagons like something out of an architect’s fever dream. Mosses and kelp streak the rocks battered by the tide and others, with small divots in their tops, collect the rain like a sacrificial font. The wind snatches at your clothing and seabirds throw themselves into the gusts, their screams echoing around the vast, alien space.
This is the home of Giants.
In famous Irish Folklore, the columns are in fact the remains of a causeway built by the Irish giant Finn MacCool. Legend goes that Finn was challenged to a fight by the Scottish giant Benandonner, and Finn accepted the challenge and built the causeway across the North Channel so that the two could meet in battle. Accounts differ on who actually won the fight, but you can be sure that whatever the outcome, present-day visitors to Northern Ireland are immensely glad they did.
I can’t accurately describe in words the majesty of the Giant’s Causeway. It is something that is best experienced with eyes and ears and hands, but let me assure you that it is something completely out of a fairytale. An ancient volcanic eruption created the beautiful stone columns, some the size of a small ottoman, others meters in length. Tide pools dot the landscape, and wild flowers from the grassy hills jostle for space with smaller, ocean-grown plants that cling to the edges of the pools. It is a place of legend and mystery, where the stories are fueled by imaginations of the young and old. I am immensely honored I could be a part of this collective knowledge of fact and fairytale.
