Cache and Bull Story Traditional Cache
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(regular)
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Cache information:
The cache is in a tab lock box of medium size. It is near a ring
fort at Lissachiggel (mentioned below) and very close to where the
Brown Bull of Cooley was said to have been hidden from Queen
Medb.
There are numerous tracks and access paths. Several of these start
at the picturesque village of Ravensdale but there are other ways
to get there.
Another cache which takes you up the The Cadgers Path is
nearby.
Cooley – Treasury of Myth and Magic
If County Louth is the Land of Legends then the Cooley Peninsula,
tucked away in the north-east corner, is its very heart – with
hardly a stick or stone that doesn’t pulsate with the imprint of
myth or history. From tales of ancient power struggles and battles
of the sexes to booley huts and lazy beds by way of passage graves
and dolmens, ring forts and fulachta fiadh, Cooley tells the story
of Ireland in microcosm.
Reaching back into the mists of time, the Táin Bó Cuailgne is one
of the most colourful episodes in ‘The Ulster Cycle’ with its tales
of King Conchobar Mac Nessa , his Red Branch Knights and their
heroic 17 year old warrior Cúchulainn. When Queen Medb of Connaught
invaded Ulster at the head of a huge army in order to seize the
magnificent Brown Bull of Cooley, the epic relates how Cúchulainn
singlehandedly held off the invading forces by fighting a series of
combats to the death. References to Cúchulainn’s heroic deeds
abound in County Louth but it is on the slopes of the Cooley
Mountains that placenames resonate to his exploits and epic
battles.
Legend has it that one of the mountains, Carnawaddy, from the
gaelic Carn an Mhadra, is so named because Cúchulainn’s favourite
dog Bran is buried under the large carn of stones on the top. His
prowess as a hurler is commemorated in the ‘Poc Fada’, a game of
giant hurling played across the slopes of Carnawaddy in August each
year.
It was in the deep valley of Dubchoire, the Black Cauldron, that
Cooley chief Daire hid his precious bull from Medb and her warriors
but to no avail –the goddess Morrigan in the shape of a raven
whispered into the great bull’s ear as he paced the valley:
"Dark one are you restless
Do you guess they gather
To certain slaughter"?
But in fact it was the warriors that were slaughtered as Cúchulainn
prowled the Hill of Ochaine with his slingshot knocking off their
heads and later when the River Cronn magically rose and swept away
the invading forces.
Medb, however, did regroup her forces and, gouging great swathes
through the mountains at Bearna Medb and Bearna Bó Cuailgne and
into Glen Gatlaig, finally outwitted the Ulstermen and made off
back to Connaught with her prize, the Táin Bó Cuailgne.
Not only epic heroes but some of the first Irish settlers have left
their imprint on this corner of County Louth. Neolithic man (or
woman!) left evidence of his/her culinary skills in kitchen middens
found at Rockmarshall while it appears that their Early Bronze Age
descendants were more attracted to the fulachta fiadh method of
cooking. Nor did they ignore the requirements of the next world –
several court tombs are to be found in the Cooley Peninsula,
Clermont Carn, a megalithic passage tomb, crowns the mountain of
the same name and between the mountains and Dundalk Bay stands the
great portal dolmen of Proleek.
Just above Dubchoire, the impressive 6th century stone ring fort of
Lissachiggel, ‘The Fort of the Rye’, overlooks the valley of Glen
Gatlaig with views over Dundalk Bay and as far south as Ireland’s
Eye. Just far enough away to be neighbourly an earthen fort or lios
protected by fairy hawthorn bushes stands guard over ancient sweat
lodges in the field below.
Archaeological excavations at Lissachiggel indicated that although
its earliest inhabitants dated from the Late Iron Age, the fort
itself was in intermittent use right up to the 18th century –
buckles were found there similar to those used on the belts of
Rapparees, wild Irish plunderers of the time named after the
‘rapary’ or half pike that they carried!
More peaceable and industrious descendants were the sheep and
cattle herders who, going up into the hills with their livestock
for summer grazing, continued the ancient tradition of ‘booleying’
– sheltering with their livestock each night in little stone huts.
Not far from the ruins of one of these booleys the sunlight
outlines strange ridges – these ‘lazybeds’ or cultivation ridges,
now covered in heather, are remnants of pre-famine potato farming
but remind us how the need for food in a much larger population
pushed to its limits the demand for fertile soil.
"The spirits of her ancestors, both real and mythological, cloak
the Cooley Peninsula in a magical haze but love and respect her and
she will disclose many secret delights".
The above piece was written by Mary P Keating of Dundalk, a native
of this lovely area and a regular walker in the Cooleys.
KOB
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Haqre fznyy cvyr bs ebpxf whfg abegu bs gur evat sbeg.
Treasures
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