Moll's Gap or Céim an Daimh (meaning, Gap of the Ox), is a mountain pass on the

N71 road The N71 road is a national secondary road traversing counties Cork and Kerry in Ireland. Towns and villages along the route, westward from Cork city, include Innishannon, Bandon, Clonakilty, Skibbereen, Bantry and Glengarriff in County Cork. C ...

from

Kenmare Kenmare () is a small town in the south of County Kerry, Ireland. The name Kenmare is the Anglicisation, anglicised form of ''Ceann Mara'', meaning "head of the sea", referring to the head of Kenmare Bay. Location Kenmare is located at the hea ...

Killarney Killarney ( ; ga, Cill Airne , meaning 'church of sloes') is a town in County Kerry, southwestern Ireland. The town is on the northeastern shore of Lough Leane, part of Killarney National Park, and is home to St Mary's Cathedral, Ross ...

in Kerry,

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. Moll's Gap is on the Ring of Kerry route, and offers views of the

MacGillycuddy's Reeks , photo=MacGuillycuddy's Reeks.jpg , photo_caption= , country=Ireland , country1= , location = County Kerry , region = Munster , region_type = Provinces of Ireland , parent= , border= , length_km=19 , length_orientation=East–West ...

mountains, and is a popular tourist location. The rocks at Moll's gap are formed of

Old Red Sandstone The Old Red Sandstone is an assemblage of rocks in the North Atlantic region largely of Devonian age. It extends in the east across Great Britain, Ireland and Norway, and in the west along the northeastern seaboard of North America. It also ext ...

, which are small quartz grains laid down over 350 million years ago; unlike most of the Old Red Sandstone around Killarney which is stained red by iron oxide, the rock at Moll's gap is stained green by chlorite. Moll's Gap is named after Moll Kissane, who ran a shebeen (an unlicensed public house) in the 1820s, while the road was under construction. Like the nearby Gap of Dunloe, Moll's Gap is an example of a "glacial breach", where a 500 metre deep glacier in the '' Black Valley'' broke through Moll's Gap 25,000 years ago during Ireland's last ice age.

References

{{authority control Geography of County Kerry Tourist attractions in County Kerry Mountain passes of Ireland

See also

References