Aran Islands Travel Guide — Things to Do, Food & Hotels
Group of three islands on the west coast of Ireland
About Aran Islands
Around 340 million years ago in the early Carboniferous age, great layers of limestone were deposited in the west of Ireland. Later glaciation wore them down and at the end of the last Ice Age 11,000 years ago, sea levels rose by 100 m. This sundered the Aran Islands from the mainland limestone area now known as theBurreninCounty Clare. The smooth limestone table began to weather into a fissured pavement known as "clints and grikes". There was no topsoil, no trees, and very little fresh water, because the rainfall plunged underground. The Burren bedrock is riddled with cave systems and perhaps these will one day be discovered on the Aran Islands. It was a bleak prospect for farming. There was a collection of dirt in the fissures, the grikes, which supported Alpine-type wild flowers, and wh
Aran Islands Travel Guide Sections
Our comprehensive guide covers 12 sections including: