The Winter Solstice has come and gone for 2016, but I wanted to share a photo of the famous Irish landmark: Newgrange during the winter solstice at dawn. 
Tickets for this special couple of days are selected by random lottery. I’ve never been lucky enough to get selected, and I’ve not been able to visit Ireland during the 3-4 days surrounding the winter solstice.
Some interesting facts about Newgrange: It was built during the Neolithic period, around 3200 BC, making it older than Stonehenge and the Egyptian pyramids. The site consists of a large circular mound with an inner stone passageway and chambers. The mound has a retaining wall at the front, made mostly of white quartz cobblestones, and is ringed by engraved kerbstones. Many of the larger stones of Newgrange are covered in megalithic art. Its entrance is aligned with the rising sun on the winter solstice, when sunlight shines through a ‘roofbox‘ and floods the inner chamber. It is the most famous monument within the Neolithic Brú na Bóinne complex, alongside the similar passage tomb mounds of Knowth and Dowth, and as such is a part of the Brú na Bóinne UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Newgrange plays a large role in my novel, The Keepers of Éire. After each murder, the killer places the human victim’s body propped against the Entrance Stone at Newgrange. Check out the Entrance Stone.
Newgrange – Entrance Stone
