Patrick’s Hill We all know that exercise is important. Yet people who live on the top of Patrick’s Hill may tell you that you can also exercise too much, especially when it becomes part of every trip to the corner shop. Alongside its impressive views, Patrick’s Hill has a reputation for its steepness. Runners and bikers take great pride in scaling it without stopping, while novice drivers may find themselves uneasily ascending or descending it.
Patrick’s Hill: An iconic view!
Patrick’s Hill also shows off beautiful aspects of the City’s geological heritage. Walking up St Patrick’s Hill you will come across an obvious Old Red Sandstone outcrop near Bruce College. This outcrop has had a wall built around it, a common style of architecture in the City. The Old Red Sandstone here shows rock textures caused by the enormous forces of the Variscan Orogeny. This makes the rocks look broken and squeezed. The vertical planar features in the rocks are here known as cleavage and they formed as the rock layers were compressed. In fact, the rocks were originally wider before the Variscan Orogeny. Getting to the top of Patrick’s Hill presents some stunning vistas over the City. Looking south towards Douglas and Grange reveals the sharp drop in elevation as the landscape moves from the more erosion-resistant Old Red Sandstone into the softer Carboniferous rocks. This landscape pattern repeats when looking to the south as one travels from Ballyphehane to Ballycurreen up the Airport Hill, where the terrain rises dramatically due to the Old Red Sandstone appearing as the foundation.
Walking over to Bell’s Field and its iconic vantage point to the northside of the City shows more of this landscape form. The whole valley system aligns east-west and can be traced from Youghal in the east all the way to Crookstown in the west. Because of its chemistry, the limestone also marks the valley of Cork City.
The Old Red Sandstone outcrop of Patrick’s Hill.
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