Exploring myths and legends in Northern Ireland, Wales and Ireland

This is the second in a three-part series on a Viking British Isles cruise. Today, we explore parts of Northern Ireland, Wales and Ireland. Last time: The trip from Norway to Scotland.

After hiking up a hill overlooking the famous Giant’s Causeway, I paused for breath by a column of basalt rocks called “The Organ” towering above me, and looked out to Northern Ireland’s Antrim Coast.

Resembling a church pipe organ, fit for a giant, the aptly named rocks are a result of a volcanic eruption almost 60 million years ago.

It was worth the trek to see The Organ up close as well as getting a bird’s eye view of the Giant’s Causeway stretched out along the coastline for six kilometres. This geological wonder is made up of about 40,000 mostly hexagon-shaped basalt columns, caused by the cooling and shrinking of lava flows following the eruption.

Each of the tightly packed columns vary in size and shape. For instance, columns on the cliff, where The Organ is located, average 100 metres in elevation, while another section of free-standing columns, called the Chimney Stacks, reach a height of 12 metres.

The rock formation names are not without reason. The surreal and dramatic terrain is steeped in myth and legend, about how a mighty Irish giant named Finn McCool created the Causeway so he could reach Scotland and fight his rival, the giant Benandonner. Legend has it The Chimney Stacks are the columns that remain standing of McCool’s house.

At the beginning of my hike, I pass a large, unusually shaped rock on the shoreline, known as the Giant’s Boot, reputedly lost by McCool. It was being enjoyed by children climbing on it, oblivious to others waiting to photograph the legendary rock.

Nearby, collections of basalt columns, clustered like giant honeycombs, attract the most tourists with some sitting on smaller columns near the shore while others take their chances and walk on slippery rocks toward the sea for a glimpse of columns submerged underwater.

While designated a World Heritage Site in 1986, the Giant’s Causeway has been attracting tourists for centuries. It has long been on my wish list of places to see so I was pleased to have the opportunity to visit during a recent 15-day Viking cruise my daughter and I took around the British Isles.

At this half-way mark of the trip, which covers six countries, we have visited Bergen, Norway, Viking’s home port and our departure point, and travelled through parts of northern Scotland — the Shetland Islands, Orkney Islands, the Highlands and Edinburgh.

We now had one full day to enjoy Northern Ireland before cruising to Holyhead, Wales, on the west coast of the United Kingdom, and then on to Dublin, Ireland. The final leg of the journey will bring us to Liverpool, Dover and London, England, with only one full day at sea.

At every port of call Viking offers included excursions and a choice of special excursions which guests pay extra to take. While we enjoyed all of our included tours, we did take four special tours during the voyage. In Northern Ireland, the included excursion is a city tour of Belfast.

Our Northern Ireland 5.5-hour visit, while primarily to see the Giant’s Causeway, included two sightseeing stops from a distance but still good vantage points for photos. The first was the ruins of Dunluce Castle, on the edge of a basalt outcropping on the Antrim Coast.

I wasn’t surprised when our guide told us the castle was once used as a set in the popular Game of Thrones television series. However, I was amazed to hear Winston Churchill once shared in its ownership but gave his part of the centuries-old castle to the government of Northern Ireland in 1928.

We also stopped at a viewpoint to look down at the Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge, first erected by salmon fishers in 1755 so they didn’t have to rely on boats to reach the island. Today, the salmon fishery is a thing of the past but visitors can still cross a 20-metre long wire/rope bridge to cross over a chasm to visit the island.

Wales

The next day brought us to Holyhead, Wales, where my daughter and I chose a Viking-included excursion to see the charming Welsh seaside town of Beaumaris, a Norman word which means “beautiful sea marsh.”

Our knowledgeable guide, Neil Johnstone, was a former archeologist in the area for 20 years, who discovered the remains of a medieval court of a Welsh prince on the Isle of Anglesey in 1992.

After a 45-minute bus ride, we parked near the town’s main tourist attraction of Beaumaris Castle, a World Heritage Site. Beaumaris Castle is considered “the greatest castle never built” since it was never finished, despite being under construction for nearly four decades between 1295 to 1330. The moated castle was to be the last of the “Iron Ring of Castles,” built by England’s King Edward I in North Wales, but Johnstone explained construction stopped after the money ran out with the king busy fighting battles in Scotland. The inner walls still needed their main towers and turrets and the top floors were yet to be added.

“The English were building these enormous castles because of the threat from the Welsh,” said Johnstone. “He builds four castles in northwest Wales — Caernaron, which is the biggest and most symbolic; Conwy, which is the prettiest, Harlech and this one in Beaumaris which is built 10 years after the others. It’s concentric, which means having two lines of defence and symmetrical and it had water defence as well, so you can bring a ship to bring supply to the castle. So if you are a castle geek, this is the most perfect.”

At the risk of becoming a “castle geek,” I asked Johnstone how he came to discover the Welsh prince’s castle, last occupied before 1282 when King Edward I defeated the Welsh.

“The local legend was there was a field of the court but no one was looking for it. It had been buried in the sand and when we uncovered the sand, the walls were standing about waist-high,” he told me, adding 25 per cent of the castle’s remains were excavated, including the Great Hall of Llys Rhosyr, one of the royal courts of the medieval Welsh prince.

After Johnstone’s discovery, the castle’s great hall was recreated at St. Fagens National History Museum, near Cardiff.

Before the end of our fascinating, history-dominated tour of Beaumaris, we also visited the town’s historic parish church, built in the 14th century; the Bulkeley Arms Hotel, built for the future Queen of England when she was 13-year-old Princess Victoria visiting Beaumaris in 1832; and the adjacent Victorian Terrane on the waterfront, built to resemble a mini Buckingham Palace inspired by the royal visit. After our walking tour through Beaumaris, there was time to visit some of the village’s many shops, some housed in medieval buildings, and see a Tudor row house from the 1400s.

Ireland

Visiting Ireland for the first time, I had a hard time deciding which of the many special excursions to take after our ship The Viking Saturn arrived to a port just outside of Dublin. While it was tempting to do the included city tour of Dublin, a UNESCO City of Literature and famous as the birthplace of some of Ireland’s best known writers like Oscar Wilde and James Joyce, we instead went for the 8-hour special excursion to the Irish countryside.

During my travels, I often like to visit botanical gardens and I was intrigued to visit the nearby County of Wicklow, known as “The Garden of Ireland” because it was the county with the highest percentage of woodlands. In Wicklow, we visited the private estate and gardens of Powerscourt, with more than 700 varies of plants and once named the third best garden in the world by National Geographic. It was first opened to the public in 1974, but a fire one month later reduced the mansion to rubble. It would be more than two decades before it reopened. During our time at Powerscourt, we explored some of its 19-hectares of formal gardens, including a walled garden, Italian and Japanese gardens, cascading terraces that took 12 years to complete, and a bit of its abundant park space. Powerscourt also has its own tower that looks out over trees planted over the past 200 years.

Before returning to the ship we also stopped for a lunch at a local pub/restaurant and at Glendalough, an early medieval monastic settlement founded in the 6th century.

Next week: Our British Isles cruise concludes with a visit to England, with stops in Liverpool, Dover and lastly Greenwich, in south-east London.

Kim Pemberton was hosted by Viking Cruises, which did not review or approve this article. Follow her on Instagram at kimstravelogue.