Meet Ireland’s scenic rock star

The Wild Atlantic Way scribbles Ireland’s rugged west coast for 2500km – from Kinsale in the south’s County Cork to Malin Head in the north’s County Donegal.

With so many coves, hamlets and towns to explore, one standout landscape midway is the Burren.

With its name taken from the Irish ‘boíreann’, meaning ‘place of stone’, this rugged karst landscape is otherworldly, haunting and steeped in legend.

Oliver Cromwell’s lieutenant once described it as “a country where there is not enough water to drown a man, wood enough to hang one, nor earth enough to bury him”.

Formed 350 million years ago beneath tropical seas and sculpted by the Ice Age, this extraordinary limestone geopark stretches across 350 square kilometres of County Clare – a region that also boasts the Cliffs of Moher, the Aran Islands and the eccentric charm of Bunratty Castle.

I’ve anchored myself for a few nights in the tiny coastal nick called Doolin: a village known for its vibrant pubs and foot-tapping, traditional Irish music.

I’m off for a day trip. Driving on the same side of the road as in Australia, I begin my 66km scenic loop by heading northeast to Lisdoonvarna, the gateway to the Burren.

Famed for its Victorian-era spas, Lisdoonvarna is better known for its matchmaking festival: a 165-year-old celebration of music, dance and speed-dating romance that draws 40,000 hopefuls each September.

Driving deeper into the limestone folds, along narrow, serpentine lanes bordered by brambles, I’m struck by the paradox of the place. Though it appears barren, the Burren has been settled since the Mesolithic era, with its stone-walled fields still tracing human inhabitancy.

This undulating moonscape seems inhospitable, yet it sustains more arctic, alpine and Mediterranean plant species per square kilometre than anywhere else on Earth.

Its wildflowers, that were Ice Age hitchhikers, bloom among crevices in the rock.

This diverse ecosystem earned the Burren recognition  as a UNESCO Global Geopark and  a Special Area of Conservation  under the EU.

Unable to resist, I pull the car over, slip off my shoes and, even though it’s freezing, I walk barefoot across the stone.

It’s a sensuous thrill of skin against an ancient seabed. Fissures known as grikes and raised slabs called clints criss-cross the surface. I walk on fossils of coral, crinoids and sea urchins.

Porcelain-dainty dwarf roses and tiny purple orchids sprout from the cracks, while bees hum and grasshoppers crackle around me.

I head southeast to the village of Kilfenora, known in ancient manuscripts as the City of Crosses. I wander its 12th-century cathedral, now partly covered by glass to protect six high  Celtic crosses, with their own stories carved in stone.

Further on stands Leamaneh Castle: once a proud, four-storey mansion with mullioned windows.

Its owner was descended from Brian Boru, one of Ireland’s last High Kings. But it’s remembered less for lineage than for its 17th century, notorious, fiery-haired mistress: Red Mary.

After her second husband died, she remarried but allegedly killed her new husband by pushing him from a third-floor window. Legend claims she cycled through 25 husbands.

She met her own grim end, buried alive in a hollowed tree by her enemies. Standing by the roadside, gazing at the castle’s dour, grey remnants, it’s not hard to imagine Red Mary’s midnight strolls.

A few kilometres on, I turn toward Carran and The Burren Perfumery. The road winds through limestone swales, passing cyclists and hikers on their own exploratory missions.

Ireland’s oldest perfumery is an oasis of stone cottages with eggshell-blue doors and slate roofs.

A path meanders through mossy gardens studded with snowdrops.

I wander into the herb gardens, bordered by braided vines and brimming with thyme, lemon balm, rosemary, sage, bergamot, wild marjoram and lungwort.

I stop for lunch in its rose-covered  tea room.

The perfumery’s organic ingredients are drawn from the Burren’s landscape. Its fragrant scent families have evocative names: Woodland, Atlantic Coast, Herb Garden, Irish Limestone.

Shelves are filled with lotions, soaps, scents, organic skincare and teas and I relieve my credit card of many euros.

The stark limestone of the Burren shelves into the Atlantic Ocean

By mid-afternoon, I’m bound for  my next port of call, or perhaps portal  of call: The Poulnabrone Dolmen – Ireland’s oldest-dated megalithic monument –awaits.

Set on a slight rise, its twin portal stones hold aloft a massive 3.6m capstone that slopes gently backward.

From afar, it rises from the limestone like an ancient torii: a gateway between worlds. ‘Poulnabrone’ translates as ‘Hole of the Sorrows’ and as I circle the monument, sleet needles my face. As the temperature dips to 5°C, I think of those who once stood here in ceremony and grief as they buried their dead.

When archaeologists excavated the tomb in the 1980s, along with beads, pottery shards, an axe and a carved bone pendant, they found the remains of 36 men, women and children. None were older than 30.

It’s humbling to stand where Neolithic hands once laid their loved ones, though not everyone shares the reverence as one nearby tourist mutters, “Kinda anticlimactic, don’t you think?”

I wince. Some places demand silence.

As the weather closes in, I drive toward the coast to Ballyvaughan, where the Tea and Garden Rooms beckon me.

Overlooking a blustery Galway Bay, I settle into the glass patio room with lemon cake and a pot of Irish tea and think of my day’s journey.

From here, it’s an hour’s drive south along the coast.

On my left, the Burren’s razor-sharp limestone terraces shelve into the sea – their glacial, granite erratics scattered like marbles along the shore.

It’s late when I roll back into Doolin, my little nick in the coast.

Gus O’Connor’s pub is pumping with fiddle, flute and bodhrán. A regular named Matty pulls two spoons from his tweed pocket and joins in, while  One-Leg Ted rises to sing a love song.

The peat fire roars, the wind rattles the windows and rain lashes in wild rhythm against the glass.

I raise my dewy pint of Guinness to the musicians and the craic, and to the Burren and its haunting beauty.

* The writer travelled at her own expense.

GETTING THERE

If you don’t want to drive yourself around the Burren, day coach tours are offered from Dublin, Galway, Limerick and Doolin. Visit ireland.com/en-au/destinations/regions/the-burren/