|
In terms of understanding the landscape, the most important site on this stretch of coast is the prehistoric farm that covers some 24 square miles of boggy moorland between Belderrig and Ballycastle. Although signposted from the road, the Belderrig site offers little enlightenment to the untrained eye: for that, carry on another five miles to the main site at Ceide Fields - pronounced "cajun" without the n - (mid-March to May & Oct daily 10am-5pm; June-Sept daily 9.30am-6.30pm; Nov daily 10am-4.30pm; GBP2.50/?3.17). As Seamus Heaney's poem Belderg observes: They just kept turning up
and were thought of as foreign
one-eyed and benign, they lie about his house
quernstones out of a bog Under nearly seven feet of blanket bog, archeologists have unearthed the stone walls of a Neolithic farm system and apparently solved the riddle of how the builders of the great megalithic tombs that run across the northern part of Ireland lived. They were, it seems, farming people who joined the original fishers and hunters of Ireland around five thousand years ago and seem to have lived in harmony with them, and each other: the pattern of settlement is dispersed and shows no defensive features. The fields run longitudinally with the slope of the land and appear to have been used for pasture - as in contemporary Ireland, where the largest single contribution to the national economy still comes from grass-raised livestock. The faint marks left by these ancient farmers don't look like much to the untrained eye, and the Ceide Fields centre is, inevitably, heavy on interpretation. The building itself is impressively conceived, the pyramidal shape not at odds with the landscape. The interior is a combination of sandstone, oak and glass and in the middle, stretching towards the apex of the pyramid is a huge piece of bog pine. The centre includes an exhibition, a viewing platform an audiovisual theatre (with a romantically voice-overed show giving some of the area's geological background) and an excellent cafe. The entrance fee also includes a guided tour, usually by one of the archeological workers on the dig.
Your Tip for Ceide Fields
Help other backpackers! Write your own guides and backpacking tips to Ceide Fields - they will appear instantly on this page - Please only write a tip/guide to Ceide Fields - visit the main Ceide Fields forum to ask a question!
Please do not post links to your site here (they won't work) - please use the Ceide Fields webguide section below! Thanks.
| 
