Traveler in Ireland — Cliffs of Moher

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Is it outdated? No, I wouldn’t dare to say that or I will be lynched by all my readers in love with the famous cliffs.

But it’s an oversell.

It was our second week in Ireland and it was so far a perfect trip. The rented car behaved, all the booked accommodations were nice and rooms were clean, the weather was a bit cloudy and occasionally we had some light rain, but it was September — autumn in a country situated in Northern Europe. What could you expect? The pussy rain was good. We did not need umbrellas and we could walk around easily enough. Lots of tea and scones go well with that weather.

Cliffs of Moher.

We arrived at the location and spent 15 minutes going in circles in the huge parking lot until we found a spot to park. That made me wonder, where all the others who rode behind us are going to park. It was really busy and felt like not enough parking for the expected crowd.

The cliffs were surrounded by a network of alleys that could take you above the cliffs and on the sides of the cliffs.

We walked 10 minutes to the ‘cliffs’ moving together with floods of people as if afraid the cliffs were going to disappear. We see the cliffs. Wow! That is something. We turn around. The ocean. Wow! Nice. And we keep walking in another alley, taking pictures, and making sure that we catch every angle. We see more cliffs. Oh, no, they are the same, just from the next alley. We go up and then back down. Fifteen minutes later we are done.

Should we go to the other side as well? What for? The same cliffs from a different angle. We go up towards the tower and we learn that the tower was built on the cliffs in 1835 by a local landowner and politician Sir Cornelius O’Brien as an observation tower for Victorian tourists.

The man was a visionary and believed that the view of the cliffs deserved a special place. On a clear day, one could see so far as 20 km into the ocean to the Aran Islands. The view must’ve been magnificent. We did not have that clear day.

Some say that he wanted to impress the women he was courting. So, here we are, perched on these cliffs with the winds in our faces because Sir Cornelius O’Brien built this tower. I think that his tower was the beginning and the creation of a huge magnet for tourists.

O’Brien Tower is the highest point of the Cliffs of Moher in County Clare of Ireland.

Ivan loved the cliffs, he was in awe and impressed by all the numbers and figures. I mean, what?

Sand and mud carried down the river for 300 million years?

The sand eroded into small particles and then deposited bit by bit until the cliffs were built up to 214 meters tall. Yes, amazing figures.

I am sure there are many cliffs all over the world that for one reason or another are… unique. Or wonderful. Or very old. Or build-up from lots of sand eroded and carried down.

And you can see very far on a clear day. Yes, beautiful views. As any other view from any other tall coastal line.

Yes, but, can you imagine what a view from a ship when you see a stretch of 18 km of tall cliffs?

Well, I am not on a ship, aren’t I?

I mean yes, nature at its best, but in the end … they are just just that — cliffs. For me it was like, OK, been there, done that. I saw it and visited it and the lesson from it is: Build a tower on top of some big cliffs, get a story connected with them, put together some numbers and figures and that’s it , you can put it on the list of ‘things to do’.

So, I’ve seen Cliffs of Moher. And such beautiful cliffs!