Fingal's Cave a walkway just above high-water level permitting exploration on foot. From the inside, the entrance seems to frame the island of Iona across the water. Romantic composer Felix Mendelssohn visited in 1829 and wrote an overture, "The Hebrides", Op. 26, (also known as "Fingal's Cave overture"), inspired by the weird echoes in the cave. Mendelssohn's overture popularized the cave as a tourist destination. Other famous 19th-century visitors included author Jules Verne, who used it in his book "Le Rayon Vert" ("The Green Ray"), and mentions it in the novels "Journey to the Center of the Earth" and "The Mysterious Island";
Drysdale Overture Dyson found it to be a mess; he did, however, give it a read-through with the College orchestra. The overture is dedicated to Robert Lilburn, the composer's father. It is meant to celebrate the family farm and estate upon which Lilburn was born. In writing it, the composer once wrote that he was "left with that lovely Mark Twain image of Jim and Huckleberry drifting on their barge down that great river, looking up at the stars and wondering 'whether they was made, or only just happened'" The "Drysdale Overture" has been recorded twice by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra: