Photos

Hello Trekkies,
Something really special today... Everyone knows Newgrange but I found for you much better place!
Loughcrew Cairns are much better then Newgrange because of their location: on highest Hill (900ft.) in Co. Meath so the view is just wonderful! Another pro: this megalithic site is not as crowded as Newgrange is. So you can explore this site alone, without hundreds of tourist, their cameras and noise.
The Loughcrew cairns are located 40 kilometres from Newgrange, situated on three hill summits near the town of Oldcastle, Co. Meath. The hills, known collectively as "Sliabh na Caillighe", or the "Mountain of the Witch" and sometimes "The Storied Hills", are individually called Carnbane West, Carnbane East and Patrickstown. The highest of these peaks reaches over 900 feet above sea level. They are probably older than Newgrange, dating to between 3500 and 3300 BC, and many contain astronomical symbolism like that at Brú na Bóinne. One of the stones is probably the world's oldest astronomical map.
Loughcrew, possibly the oldest cemetery in the world, tells of Ireland’s neolithic cultures, shrouded in myth and mystery. One legend has it that the so-called burial mounds were created by a witches flying overhead and dropping pebbles on the landscape. Sounds hard to believe but who’s to say otherwise? The tombs are located on three different hills. The largest of the three Cairn T has a vernal and Autumunal Equinox which is when the chamber becomes illuminated with sunlight. The sun light is shaped by the stones of the entrance and passage and descends the backstone while moving from left to the right illuminating the solar symbols. The key to Loughcrew Cairn T is available at Loughcrew Gardens. The owner of the land on Carnbane West where Cairn L is located is not allowing public access to the site.

On my picture: the passage tomb at Loughcrew: magnificent, mighty and virtually unknown. This massive prehistoric mound is nothing less than the Irish equivalent of Egypt’s pyramids; both witnessed the passage of the dead from this world to the next. As with the pyramids, Loughcrew continues to perplex and amaze; the burial complex in Meath possibly more so - it predates its desert cousins by 2000 years!

If you were so patient to read it all, here is small bonus for you: The progress of the sunbeam on the backstone inside Cairn T at Loughcrew was video recorded at sunrise on the morning of March 23rd 2005. The 50 minute video has been compressed to 1 minute 46 seconds and included in the following YouTube Video.
TURN ON YOUR COMPUTER SPEAKERS!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7yKJUFU7BXo

Thank you for the visit!
Chris