DAY 8 - Friday / Camac Valley Caravan Park - Newgrange / 80 miles

25/07/2014 / Friday / Camac Valley Caravan Park - Newgrange / 80 miles

Fig. 1 - View taken to the left of the entrance to the Newgrange Cairn.

Friday morning, I drag myself up and ride to Newgrange, wishing for more sleep. But soon wake up once I’m back on the bike and find it’s great not to be held back by all the luggage and I end up having a very rejuvenating ride.

As I have the time, I book the whole tour which lasts 3 hours, plus I spend a good hour in the visitor centre at the end.

Fig. 2 - The second site called 'Knowth'.

Buses take you to the two sights with tour guides, who are very genned up to answer all your questions. Visitors come from all over the world and as I listen about me I can hear French, American, German and Dutch.

I do my usual trick and daftly board the wrong tour bus, and I’m soon hoofed off by the driver, which lands me next to 3 Americans, that come from just outside Los Angelis. I end up chatting to one fella in the group, who has a very chilled out attitude and confides in me that, "this miffs the other two off as their the type of traveller, who’s always time conscious and schedule orientated, but at his time of age, he say he’s past caring and enjoys winding them up, so takes his jolly time about things. I'm on his side and we enjoy a lot of the tour together.

Fig. 3 - View of the extents of the main Cairn at Newgrange.

Fig. 4 - Waiting our groups turn to explore.

Fig. 5 - The entrance, showing the highly decorated entrance stone.

Fig. 6 - View of the white quartz stone on the front.

Fig. 7 - View from on top of the Knowth passage tomb.

There are two, in fact three sights. The most famous passage tomb, or Cairn, is 'Newgrange', dating back to 200BC. Being 80m in diameter and constructed using around 200,000 tonnes of water-rolled stone, quarried from the River Boyne with quartz stones, used on the front wall, taken from County Wicklow and other stone material used in its construction coming from the Mourne and Carlingford areas.

There is a 19m long passage way, leading to a small chamber in the heart of the Cairn. This chamber has a corbelled roof or interlaced stone, with a large capstone that sits 6m above ground level and is still water-tight after 5000 years!
At the entrance to the passage way there is a low doorway you have to duck under, then half way along you the passageway narrows tightly before opening up into the centre chamber. Being as it was a hot sunny day outside the temperature was refreshingly cooling, as all the earth on top acts as insulation.

The guide asks everyone to be still for a few moments, to allow our eyes to adjust, and after a short while, I start to see more clearly, the detail of the tombs construction, as well as the stone art that's carved into the surfaces.

The second site is called Knowth, its larger than Newgrange at 95m, at its widest, and has two passage tombs. It is also surrounded by 18 smaller satellite tombs.

Thanks to extensive excavation, there is evidence that over the ages the same area has been used for various cultural a ritual activities, dating all the way back to 2500 BC.

Finally there is Dowth, of similar age, is the least known of the three site's and the one I forgot to have a look at, as it's not included on the tour, but you are free to visit it yourself. Dowth is as large as the other two sites but has not been as heavily excavated. The mound contains, similarly to Knowth, two passage tombs, but with much shorter passage ways and also contains the biggest stones of the three sites.

More information can be found Here.

Fig. 8 - Knowth tomb, surrounded by highly decorated stones.

Fig. 9 - An image made black and white to highlight the stones carved symbols.

Fig. 10 - A symbol chart of the symbols so far found.

Back at the visitor centre, I fill out a leaflet for a competition to win a chance to be in the Newgrange tomb, when the Winter Solstice arrives, to see the sun align and shine down through the passage way!
I’m also hungry and subjugate to getting fleeced, for something to eat, after which I have a walk around and enjoy the exhibitions, before heading back to the campsite.

On the way back, I decide to pop into Dublin to try and sort my phones connection problems out, as I still can’t get signal here in Ireland. I spot a computer shop and reason that there, I’ll find people more IT savvy than me and would most likely know more, about solving my issues than I would, so I park up on the pavement, next to a Landover parked out the front of the shop. It turns out there’s not much they can do to help and suggest I go to my service providers website, to see if I can seek help there. I’m directed to an internet shop down the street. I leave my bike outside and go find the internet café 100 yards further down the street. The Indian chap, who runs the place didn’t care much about my questions but instead directs me to a terminal where I can search for myself. After having a quick glance through T-mobiles website I cannot see any fixes, so accept my situation and instead I think about preparing to meet my friends the following morning.

Using the power of Google, I try to find the Dublin ferry port but get confused, as the images look completely different from where I docked a week ago. I soon figure out that in fact I didn’t dock in Dublin at all but further South at Dún Laoghaire. Having gotten the tickets a while before I left, I’d subsequently forgotten where I was docking and just presumed that it would be in Dublin itself. Luckily I was certain that my friends would be docking in Dublin and after failing to find it on Google, I found a tourist information, just around the corner from the café, where I ask and am given a paper map with directions, as there’s no postcodes in Ireland, yet!

On the way back to the bike, from the public information centre, I'm stopped by Michaella Itaire and before I know it, I find myself a member of Amnesty International, but all for a good cause. I pick up the bike from the IT shop, firstly updating them on my success or lack off and head back to the campsite.

As I catch up with an evening of blogging, I find myself working away in a small room off the reception, with a couple of tables and a few chairs. In the middle of my table is a power socket extension, where I have my phone sat charging away.

I sit and eat my petrol station sandwich, bought earlier in the day and spend until midnight scribbling away, interspersed with chatting to a few guys, are part of a Scout Group from the Netherlands and are over here on a hiking trip around the area. It turns out that they're heading back tomorrow, so kindly give me their well-used paper OS maps, where they suggest visiting Great Sugar Loaf Hill, which has fantastic views. We exchange details, as I'd like to visit the Netherlands sometime, and it doesn't harm getting to know people around the world, it’s good to cultivate contacts, for future travels.

I end the night, by helping a French guide to plug his slightly broken laptop adaptor in and chat a little about what we are both doing in Ireland.