The Burren, which basically means “rocky” (although some translate it as “Rocky IV”), is a 100-square-mile karst landscape, meaning that its topography is made up of partially dissolved rock. In many cases, and in the case of the Burren, that rock is limestone. Rain and other water sources wore down the rocks like cola on a tooth until it achieved weird fragmented shapes, in this case grikes and clints, which are basically nooks and crannies.

In fact, it won’t take much Googling before you see somebody describing their visit to the Burren as "like walking on the moon,” which is probably the most ridiculous simile in the language. I mean, 12 people in the history of the world know what it's like to walk on the moon. The other six billion of us have no clue. So I’m not sure exactly how that became such a common expression. I blame Sting.
Anyway, as one who has not walked on the moon but who has walked on the Burren, I can offer you very little in the way of similes. It’s a crazy-looking rock plateau that’ll make you keep your eyes fastened to the ground both because it’s crazy-looking and because it’s real easy to trip over the grikes and clints if you’re not wary.

The Burren kind of looks like the tread of an upturned boot. If you’re wearing a pair, play along at home. The furrows in between the treads are the grikes, and the upraised bits of rubber shaped by the furrows are the clints. Of course, since the tread at topic here covers 100 square miles, I don't want to meet the buried-head-first giant who’s wearing the Burren on his feet.
The region also apparently has a strangely diverse array of flora growing between its cracks. However, I only saw hills and hills of rock interspersed here and there with grasses. Like the Burren had gotten a bunch of stuff stuck between its teeth while chewing. Of course, it was a chilly March day when I visited. And I wasn’t there to see its life. I was there to see its death.

Dolmens are the stone remains of ancient mound tombs, where all the dirt has worn away, leaving only its table-like infrastructure. The pi-shaped nature of many of these dolmens also wins them the name portal tombs since they look like doorways. Also, I’ve heard, because if you walk through them, you’ll be transported to Nobpot, Nebraska. This is, of course, just a rumor since nobody’ll actually test the idea. Apparently, nobody wants to even possibly end up in Nobpot.
These pi/table/doorway-shaped dolmens occur all over Ireland, Europe, and the world. In fact, there are scores of them on the Burren itself, maybe even up to a hundred. None is more famous than Poulnabrone, though. Probably none more accessible, either, since it has its own parking lot. Of course, they do have the dolmen roped off at a discreet circumference to protect it from us and, I assume, us from becoming accidental Nebraskans.

I’d like to say that this multi-lith has been standing untouched on the pseudo-wasteland of the Burren for its entire multi-millennial life. Unfortunately, sometime in the mid-80s, the dolmen collapsed due to a crack in one of its stones. It’s just one more thing we can blame that decade for. Fortunately, they were able to put Humpty Dumpty back together again, replacing the cracked stone with a similarly sized one.

It’s kind of an amazing thing overall. I mean, here you are, just a tiny range of decades old, staring at a pile of rocks that’s a few millennia old sitting on top of another pile of rocks that’s hundreds of millennia old. Talk about late to the party. And all I can do to express my awe is make a Rocky IV joke.
This is the end of the article, but I would like to admit that I made up the town of Nobpot, Nebraska. I currently don’t really have a stock town that I like to make fun of. I am working on it, though, and any suggestions are welcome.
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This way to Nobpot. |