The Burren is one of those geological areas of Ireland that just blow you away. It is an area of about 10 square miles in the northwest of County Clare, formed over 250 million years ago.
looking away at the summits of Turloughmore
It helps to know that Ireland was originally located at the equator. Yes, before continental drift pushed things this way and that, Ireland was a hot, humid area rich with life evolving. Remember those Tetrapods from my earlier blog? Coming out of the water down around Valentia Island in southern Ireland, evolving into our mammalian ancestors? 
Well, after that happened, in the more recent times of the ice age of 10,000 years ago, glaciers moved across the land. The Burren is the result of them coming and going, scouring the land bare of all life leaving nothing but exposed limestone.
Rains then came and went, creating a form of acid which ate through the limestone, leaving crevices, forming the strange looking plateau that is today called in English, the Burren. Originally Gaelic, boireann, and meaning literally, “the rocky land”. 
At first glance it seems inhospitable to life.
In fact, when the English came to assess Ireland for whichever lands they thought fit for stealing, they wrote the Burren off. Ignorant of them because it hosts more diverse life forms than anywhere else on the island. 
wildflowers in the Burren
As the eons passed, those crevices, called grykes, filled with rainwater, creating algae, which in turn fed life forms as they evolved. Soon small mammals like rabbits and mice left behind their droppings, further enriching the space between the blocks of limestone (which are called glints) and all manner of plant life began to adapt and take root.
grykes and glints in the Burren
Mostly the plants are flowers and small fern like things,
with occasional small shrubs and grasses that eventually get eaten by roaming goats and sheep. 
I marveled at the way they push themselves up sometimes right between huge slabs and take root.
The Burren became a place for Neolithic peoples to build their stone forts and burial portals. Poulnabrone is only one of several dolman tombs in the area, but because of its size it has somehow become the one the tour buses aim for. Interesting to note that 33 individuals were buried here around 3000 B.C., along with their tools, fragments of pottery, some quartz beads and an axe. 
Poulnabrone Dolman 
There are hundreds of pre-Christian and then later, Christian sites found within the Burren. 
It is an archaeological as well as biological marvel.
I spent most of an afternoon wandering among the limestone glints and grykes of Mullaghmore, the wildest part of the Burren. 
This was a tricky business to be sure, but since for hundreds of years penitents and pilgrims have done the same, creating an astonishing visual vista, I figured that a mobility limited modern woman should be able to handle it. 
There are hundreds of cairns and stone displays built by pilgrims such as myself. 
beautiful pilgrim displays
built by those of us who come here for whatever reasons bring people to such a remote location.
I moved a fairly heavy limestone slab into an upright position while speaking my intentions, 
thus adding Nyla Anne energy to that of those who have passed before.
Being as it was July, the area was rich with wildflowers, the smell being delicate but very sweet and clean. I breathed deeply, over and over again, swallowing the taste of pure, clean air gratefully into my lungs and 
giving thanks to All That Is for the opportunity to do so.
I think St. Colmchille would have approved.