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The Burren (Boireann, "great rock") is a large area of northern County Clare, in the west of Ireland, with karst landscape - a great bare limestone sheet sculpted by water action. Part of it is The Burren National Park, and part is The Burren and Cliffs of Moher Geopark. The area is loosely defined, with no park perimeters, entry fees or permits. To the west, the Aran Islands are the geological continuation of the Burren, but are not included here.
During Cromwell's campaign in Ireland, his local commander Edmund Ludlow said of the Burren "It is a country where there is not enough water to drown a man, wood enough to hang one, nor earth enough to bury him." Those they were harrying were "tories" - bandits and guerrillas allied to the Royalist cause, before that word became a political description. Yet Ludlow went on to commend the local cattle that grazed on flowers and grass hidden in the limestone clefts. The clints and grykes of the Burren are its yang and yin.
The limestone was laid down in a bed 800 m thick in the early Carboniferous Age 325 million years ago. It was later overlain by shale and sandstone, but this was scoured away by glaciers in the late Quaternary Period. The last scouring ended 10,000 years ago, geologically quite recent, so most sculpting of the landscape began after that last thaw. A thin soil persisted until Neolithic times, then was lost to deforestation and overgrazing. This has led to a pavement-like landscape, with the "clints" being the bare, roughly rectangular rocks, and the "grykes" the clefts between, which retain soil and vegetation. Streams can't run above ground across this terrain, they plunge below to flow through caves. Farmers therefore lack water except in the polje - craters a km or more in diameter that trap water and become grassland; these have been created by pre-glacial rivers. Here and there lie "erratics", huge boulders of non-local material such as granite dumped by the glaciers.
The limestone terrain supports many rare plants including orchids, butterflies, the elusive pine marten, and feral goats. It's hardly the country for dairy farming, agriculturally what it's best for is growing rocks.
Bus 350 follows the coast from Galway six times a day via Kinvarra, Ballyvaughan, Fanore, Lisdoonvarna, Doolin, Cliffs of Moher, Liscannor, Lahinch, Ennistymon, Corofin and Inagh to Ennis. So coming from Dublin by road or rail, it's quicker to travel to Galway then take the bus south, than to travel via Limerick and Ennis and go north. However from Shannon Airport, head first for Ennis.
Inland across the Burren, buses run about as often as Shrove Tuesday coincides with an eclipse. You need a car: Shannon airport and Galway city are the best bets.
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