Cloughmore facts for kids
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Cloughmore or Cloghmore is a giant rock in Northern Ireland. Its name comes from the Irish words An Chloch Mhór, which means "the big stone." People in the area often call it "The Big Stone."
This huge granite boulder sits high up on a mountain. It's almost 300 meters (1,000 feet) above the village of Rostrevor in County Down. You can find it on the side of Slieve Martin mountain, inside Kilbroney Park. From there, it looks out over Rostrevor Forest, Carlingford Lough, and the Cooley Peninsula. Cloughmore is a popular spot for visitors. It's also part of a special protected area called a National Nature Reserve and an Area of Special Scientific Interest.
What is Cloughmore?
Cloughmore is a massive rock, weighing about 50 tonnes. That's like the weight of ten elephants! It's a type of rock called a glacial erratic. This means it was carried a long way by a glacier.
How Did It Get Here?
Scientists believe this huge stone traveled all the way from Scotland. It might have come from an island in Strathclyde bay. About 10,000 years ago, during the last Ice Age, giant sheets of ice covered much of the land. As these glaciers slowly moved, they picked up rocks. When the ice melted, it dropped the rocks in new places. That's how Cloughmore ended up on Slieve Martin. It sits on a flatter area of older rock called Silurian metasedimentary rock.
The Giant's Story
There's a fun local legend about how Cloughmore got to its spot. The story says that a famous giant named Fionn mac Cumhaill threw the stone. He supposedly tossed it from the Cooley Mountains. These mountains are on the other side of Carlingford Lough, across the water from Cloughmore.
