Cheap Car Hire: Of Giants and Spanish Bullion
By: mlauterwein | Posted: 28th March 2008
Fionn mac Cumhaill (Finn McCool) was a bad thrower because when he scraped up most of Ulster’s heart to hurl at his Scottish counterpart across the water, the earth and stone splashed into the Irish Sea and formed the Isle of Mann. The depression in the centre of the province filled up with water and became Lough Neagh, Britain’s largest body of fresh water. Even though he was miles off, McCool never stopped trying to get at his rival and the story of his attempt to bridge the strait by building the great causeway is famous worldwide.
The basalt pillars of the Giant’s Causeway are Northern Ireland’s most popular tourist attraction and the debate as to how the swelling visitor numbers should be catered for is fierce. Proposals to build up parts of the coast adjacent to the promontory with hotels and restaurants a la the Grand Canyon have been criticised for their potentially ruinous impact on the Antrim coast. Local desire to exploit interest in the feature could wreck the thing many are looking for, that is to say, wild grandeur, remoteness.
Cheap car hire in Belfast opens up the whole of the Antrim coast for the visitor looking to escape the crowds that can blight many of mainland Britain’s scenic hotspots such as the Lake District. The seascape is marked by treacherous reefs, outcrops and sheer cliffs. Several Galleons of the Armada broke on these rocks, laden with gold, en route to Spain. A long distance footpath snakes out from the causeway and from here the dramatic scenery is best surveyed. On this footpath the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge crosses a 25 yard chasm to a small island.
With cheap car hire it would also be possible to visit Rathlin Island. This place sums up the signature perils of these coasts. Three lighthouses warn shipping against the hazardous breaks and swirling currents and they loom up like great monuments to all the sailors who have drowned hereabouts: any roll call of their names (were they all known) would fill scores of pages. Apart from their ghosts, the island hosts a colony of grey seals and many sea birds. There are views across to Argyll most days, it is so close.
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Tags: cheap car hire, visitor numbers, irish sea