Skellig Islands also known as planet
active from Star Wars are two small
islands off mainland Ireland this is
where Luke Skywalker's home was filmed
in Episode seven and eight skellig
michael sits a little over seven miles
west of mainland ireland founded around
the 6th century the place has been a
refuge where people retreated to connect
with the divine luke's home is based off
the real Christian monastery that is
found at the top of the island
670 steps built into the rock lead up to
the monastery these are the same stairs
rey climbs up in the force awakens to
meet Luke the monastic site is built on
a terraced shelf 600 feet above sea
level it's at the very top of these
where the monks use dry stone
construction methods to create different
levels of terraces to establish the
monastery these walls also provided
shelter from the wind and are what
helped create the microclimate which
facilitated the growth of their gardens
which allowed vegetables to grow at
twice the speed of mainland sites
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the name Skellig derives from scale ik
which means a steep rock around 1044 ad
the monastery on the island was
dedicated to Saint Michael the Archangel
it contains six dry stones beehive huts
these huts were round on the outside and
rectangular on the inside they were
built this way so not a drop of rain
could ever enter between the stones it
is estimated that no more than 12 monks
lived here at one time
a hermit also lived on the south peak a
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carefully engineered system was also
created for collecting and purifying the
water despite the isolation of the
location it was sophisticated and showed
how the monks managed to deal with a
hostile environment stone crosses and
slabs are also found as well as a
cemetery in a garden a medieval church
was built later
their diet consisted of vegetables and
fish and the meat and eggs of birds
nesting on the island were crucial for
survival the monks would descend the 670
steps early every morning and fish for
breakfast and the rest of the day
consisted of praying in the church
studying and working on their gardens
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puffins visit in late spring for a few
months it is at this time they breed and
fatten their chicks with the available
food found in the Atlantic Ocean in fact
the pork seen in episode eight are based
on the puffins that live on skellig
michael the director of episode 8 brian
johnson stated that the inspiration for
these came while on location scout and
skellig michael
Skellig Michael was attacked by Viking
several times in 823 ad one of the monks
was taken captive and carried off the
island to be left to starve to death the
monastery remain occupied until around
the 12th century during this time the
climate around skellig michael became
colder and more prone to storms and
during the change of the structure of
the irish church prompted the community
to abandon the island and move to the
church off the kerry peninsula Skellig
Michael became a UNESCO World Heritage
Site in 1996 during the summer season
for boat licenses are granted to bring
tourists to the island up to 12 people
per boat a day everything is weather
permitting
since the islands get hit by massive
storms often preventing people from
getting on to the island because of that
there were big restrictions while
filming Star Wars Episode 8 in fact they
reconstructed a similar set to the one
found at the top of skellig michael on
the coast of Ireland's cliffs this was
done to help preserve the site
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little Skellig the next Island over
contains the second-biggest Gannet bird
colony in the world with almost 30,000
pairs of birds little Skellig is closed
to the public as a sanctuary for birds
the very nature of these islands
provides safety where they can nest and
rear their young with the Atlantic Ocean
providing rich feeding grounds whilst
making access difficult for humans and
keeping the islands free from predators
the extreme remoteness of Skellig
islands makes it one of the hardest
places in the world to visit and allows
it to be one of the most unique places
in the world a place at the edge of the
map a place lost in time in a galaxy far
far away
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you
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