Grikes and Guinness

We all know that geology is the study of rocks.  What you may not know is that here, so is geography, history, anthropology, sociology, ecology, biology, chemistry, and physics.  Even the word "Burren" comes from the Gaelic word "Boireann" which literally means "rock place."  Basically, over a zillion years, earthquakes and tectonic shifts made hairline cracks in the limestone surface of the Burren, which, with time and erosion, became big cracks.  Factor in some magic from the acidic rain interacting with the basic limestone, and you get Clints and Grikes (chunks of rock, and fissures between the chunks, respectively), Karst features (big things.  For example natural amphitheaters that look like meteor craters, and Turloughs, which are lakes that percolate through the rock bed with the rising and falling water table, forming and vanishing again over the span of a few months) and Karren features (small things.  Spirals and divets in cool patterns on the rock).  Glaciers also had a hand in building the landscape, picking up great massive rocks and knocking them around until they're smooth before dropping them back down in random spots, where they protect the underlying rock from the rain, forming pedestals for themselves.  Today and yesterday and the day before we took walking tours of different places in the Burren, learning about the history and geology of the place.  I never knew rocks could be so interesting!
It's crazy cool, and I have a butt-ton of pictures.

We also went into this forest where apparently Saint Coleman and his "manservant" lived (alone. for five years. together........) Anyway, there's a holy well in that spot, and we went and saw it, and it is what every enchanted forest should be.  And I took pictures.  Also, a goat fell into a Grike and died there, and so of course I fished bones out and took pictures of them too.

Also worth noting, I have been running every morning at 7.  For all you eyebrow-raisers, I have a witness - Johns Hopkins football player and my new running buddy, Luke Sand.  Fantastic dude for any of you lucky enough to meet him.  This is him on the left, and his teammate/program-mate/boyfriend (apparently) named Kevin, matching.

We hiked for four hours today, so I'm crashing now.  Mahony, OUT!