Landforms+Ireland









Hi, This is Mill Creek School in Illinois, USA. We are curious about those retangled shaped rocks. Could you tell us more about them? And the last picture. What is that kind of terrain?

Those rectangle shaped rocks are in a place in County Antrim in Northern Ireland called "The Giant's Causeway" It was declared a World Heritage site by Unesco in 1986. The rock is basalt and the area is made up of over 40,000 interlocking basalt columns which are the result of an ancient volcanic eruption. The last picture was taken when we went sketching for our art class down by the pier on Kinvara Bay just near our school. The terrain is seaweed on rocks at low tide.

Is that a castle in picture 2? -Juneau Community Charter School

Yes that is Dunguaire Castle in picture 2. It is a 16th century tower house which was built by the O'Hynes Clan (family) in 1520 and is situated just on the outskirts of our village.

This is St Monica's in Victoria, Australia. What type of fish do these boats fish for? Lots of these boats don't fish at all but the ones that do are owned by a German fisherman who has lived in our village for many years and fishes mainly for mackerel but also farms oysters in the bay. The black boat with the white stripe in the right of the photo is called a "Galway Hooker" and is a traditional boat from this area. It was mainly used in days gone by for transport of turf (peat from the bog used in Ireland as fuel for making fires in the fireplace) and other goods to the Aran Islands which are three islands off the coast of Galway and Clare. In recent decades, with the arrival of better road systems and ferries, the boats have not been used for this purpose. However there has been a revival of these boats through a number of festivals around the Galway coastline one of which is Cruinniú na mBád which means The Gathering of the Boats. This takes place in Kinvara during the month of August every year. You can read more about it here http://kinvara.com/cruinniu/index.html

The other boats in the picture are sailing boats owned by different people in the community.

Questions from Kingsclear Consolidated School:

Picture 1: Why are there so many boats? Is that a harbour? Yes this is a small harbour or quay as we call it. There are lots of small harbours like this around the coast. There is a lot of interest locally in boats. We have a small sailing club and as well as that there are many people in the village and surrounding areas who have a sailing boat and who keep it in the water here during the summer months. The majority of the boats you see in the water here are for pleasure. There is a traditional boat (black with white stripe) in the picture - here's what we told St Monica's in Australia (above) about these boats....

The black boat with the white stripe in the right of the photo is called a "Galway Hooker" and is a traditional boat from this area. It was mainly used in days gone by for transport of turf (peat from the bog used in Ireland as fuel for making fires in the fireplace) and other goods to the Aran Islands which are three islands off the coast of Galway and Clare. In recent decades, with the arrival of better road systems and ferries, the boats have not been used for this purpose. However there has been a revival of these boats through a number of festivals around the Galway coastline one of which is Cruinniú na mBád which means The Gathering of the Boats. This takes place in Kinvara during the month of August every year. You can read more about it here

http://kinvara.com/cruinniu/index.html

Are there a lot of seafood restaurants there? The Yellow Building is a lovely restaurant called the Pier Head and they do a lot of seafood but they are not specifically a seafood restaurant. We have a number of restaurants like that in Kinvara Picture 2: Is that a beach with a castle in the background? Well, it could be called a pebbly beach - its actually around the corner to the right as you look at the first photograph so it's part of the entrance to the harbour or "quay". We took the photograph when we were sketching for our Art class. Nobody really goes onto this "beach" as it is not always visible - It's just that the tides were extremely low on this day and the water was far out.

Picture 3: What is that big thing that that person is sitting on? Is it an old castle that’s ruined? No not a castle that is ruined but a series of basalt rocks - here's the answer that we posted for Mill Creek School Illinois up above ... Those rectangle shaped rocks are in a place in County Antrim in Northern Ireland called "The Giant's Causeway" It was declared a World Heritage site by Unesco in 1986. The rock is basalt and the area is made up of over 40,000 interlocking basalt columns which are the result of an ancient volcanic eruption...

Picture 4: Is that a big rock underneath the sunset or an island? This is one of the Blasket islands which are islands off the coast of County Kerry where our teacher comes from. Kerry is in the south west of Ireland. These islands were lived on until the early 1950s when the people who remained there were moved off onto the maoinland. The Great Blasket or the largest of the islands was famous for the amount of great writers who came from there. Their books which were originally written in the Irish language, have been translated into many different languages all over the world. This island is called "Inis Tuaisceart" or the North island but it is known locally as " An Fear Marbh" which means The Dead Man as it looks like the shape of a man.

Was this picture taken at sunset or sunrise? The island is on the South west coast of Ireland so it was taken at sunset.

Picture 5: Is that seaweed on a beach? Yes, we have lots of seaweed around here especially when tides are high. Carrageen is a type of seaweed that people eat, dilisk is another. People also put seaweed on their gardens as it has a lot of rich nutrients which help to make the ground fertile.

Hi, this is North Star School. Thanks for posting your pictures, they were very interesting. We have some questions for you:

- In the third picture how are the rocks shaped like rectangles? Is the wall man-made or natural and does it serve a purpose? The rocks are shaped like this because of an ancient volcanic eruption - not sure when. The rock is basalt

- Are the boats in the bay used for fishing and how many boats are there? None of the boats in the picture are used for fishing although there are some small fishing boats moored further out the bay belonging to a local fisherman. The number of boats in the bay changes depending on time of year

- How big is the bay? Kinvara Bay is part of Galway Bay - we're not sure how big it is in total but the inside part from pier to castle is about two square miles.

- How far from land is the island in picture 4 and is it used for anything? We think it's about three miles from the mainland. No nobody lives on the island now. The island is one of the Blasket islands off the South West coast of Ireland. The last people to live on these islands moved to the mainland in 1953

Questions about the topic after looking at the photos (1 per school). Please state which school is asking question. Responses listed after each question.