{"id":3762037,"date":"2021-01-12T15:52:07","date_gmt":"2021-01-12T14:52:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/escales.ponant.com\/?p=3762037"},"modified":"2026-03-03T11:11:37","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T10:11:37","slug":"giants-causeway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/escales.ponant.com\/us\/giants-causeway\/","title":{"rendered":"The mysterious Giant’s Causeway"},"content":{"rendered":"

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In County Antrim, Northern Ireland, lies a volcanic puzzle which is a source of fascination for many curious travellers. Listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site since 1986, the Giant\u2019s Causeway dominates the coastline, surrounded by green meadows . A breath-taking landscape, whose sheer brutality strikes curious travellers who come to explore the region. Over 40,000 blocks stand side-by-side, looking like they were meticulously assembled. However, nature created this geometric wonder without human help.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Rooted in legend<\/h2>\n

Legend has it that\u00a0<\/span>two giants,\u00a0<\/span><\/strong>Fionn Mac Cumhaill and\u00a0<\/span><\/strong>Benandonner<\/strong>, an Irishman and a Scotsman, hated each other. Following yet another argument, Fionn, the Irishman, decided to confront his rival face-to-face. He built\u00a0<\/span>a bridge out of stone columns<\/strong>\u00a0so Benandonner could reach Ireland without getting his feet wet. When Fionn\u2019s wife saw this enormous giant crossing the bridge, she was very worried and so disguised her husband as a baby to hide him. When he saw the \u2018baby\u2019, Benandonner took fright, thinking that its father must be truly ginormous, and fled back to\u00a0<\/span>Scotland<\/a><\/u>, destroying part of the causeway behind him. The Irish are particularly fond of these legends, which they are brought up on from a very young age.<\/span><\/p>\n

A complicated geological phenomenon<\/h2>\n

We must look to\u00a0<\/span>geology<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>for a more rational explanation of these stone blocks. It all started with a\u00a0<\/span>magma flow<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>during the\u00a0<\/span>Cenozoic era<\/strong>, some 66 million years ago. Cooling very quickly, the lava solidified and turned into\u00a0<\/span>igneous rock: basalt<\/strong>. The site lies on the\u00a0<\/span>Antrim Plateau<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>which was created by layers of lava flows: a\u00a0<\/span>trapp<\/strong>. The\u00a0<\/span>change in temperature<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>then fragmented the basalt into columns, first vertically, then horizontally. Finally,\u00a0<\/span>marine erosion<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>took care of smoothing the surface, so creating a true geometric plateau. The sequence that can be seen by the naked eye can be used to analyse the various events that have shaped the landscape.<\/p>\n

This basalt mystery provides the ideal opportunity to go on excursions\u00a0<\/span>in Ireland and Northern\u00a0<\/span><\/strong>Ireland<\/a><\/u><\/strong>, from Dublin to Belfast, and why not venture over to\u00a0<\/span>Great Britain<\/strong>, which is brimming with hidden treasures too?<\/p>\n

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PONANT takes you there<\/span><\/p>\n

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Discover this absolutely incredible site during a trip to the Celtic Sea.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Take a closer look at one of nature\u2019s geometric wonders<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3762053,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_sitemap_exclude":false,"_sitemap_priority":"","_sitemap_frequency":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1187],"tags":[],"thematique":[1470,1485,1499],"class_list":["post-3762037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-curiosities-us","thematique-europe-us","thematique-natural-wonders-us","thematique-volcanoes-us"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThe mysterious Giant's Causeway | PONANT US Magazine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/escales.ponant.com\/us\/giants-causeway\/\" \/>\n<meta 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