Carole, Viveka, and I were in Dingle. We were looking for Dun Beg and jumped out to look at the astonishing view, when a friendly farmer stopped to chat with us.
This was his advice: “The day is long, the work is hard, so take your time whenever you can.” Wise words!
Me: “Do your sheep ever fall over the cliff?” (thinking of Thomas Hardy)
Him: “No, I’ve a good dog.”
Fahan beehive huts
Again, I resort to old-timey tech to show this to you.
I have no idea why or how people lived in these structures. There aren’t enough trees there to build with wood, but why this design? Your guess is as good as mine.
The Blaskets
People used to live on these remote islands but it was a very hard life. One by one they made the decision to leave, until only a couple dozen were left. During winter storms, it was impossible to help them in an emergency. In 1954 it was decided to move them to the mainland and close the islands to habitation. Those people were among the last who remembered a way of life that has disappeared.
Reask monastic site
This was a monastic site originally from the 5th or 6th century, but that’s about all we know. They aren’t even sure when it was abandoned. Any records were lost long ago. So many ancient or historical places have suffered from neglect if not outright destruction.
Reask has (or had) a collection of unusual stone pillars, but I don’t think anybody really knows what they are or what they mean. This one above, I’ve seen called a Greek cross, and an ogham stone, and a standing stone. Some have been moved to a local museum.
An excavation in the 1970s discovered that Reask does contain some graves, but they’re not Neolithic. This is another tragic story in Ireland’s past. Illegitimate babies could not be buried in consecrated ground, so they were buried in abandoned places like this, unmarked and forgotten. They are called cillín or ceallúnach. The graves here appear to date from the late Medieval period. I’d call this a history lesson but this was going on well into the 1970s.
Kilmalkedur church
The church here now dates from the 12th century, but it’s another early Christian site that was probably built on a holy place from the pre-Christian days.
The Irish didn’t have a written language, but they did have a writing system called ogham. It consisted of hash marks carved into stone and was pretty much just used for labeling stuff. This one says a guy’s name and dates from around 600 AD. The hole is unusual.
In this part of Ireland, giant banks of fushia bloom in June, ten feet high, lining the roads. It grows wild, as do the beautiful rhododendrons. This picture doesn’t even begin to do it justice.
Cloghane churchyard
We spent some time poking around this old cemetery, which is one of the few where Protestants and Catholics were buried in the same graveyard. Many of the graves are badly ruined, broken headstones, crypts cracked open, bones visible inside, as if this place was long ago forgotten. Yet nearby you’d find a fairly recent grave. We had a spooky encounter with a disappearing man there.
This fellow below is said to be Crom Dubh, a pre-Christian Celtic god. Google tells me it was stolen in 1993, so I was lucky to see it.
Lough Gur, part 1
The following weekend, I took the train down to Dingle, where Carole had been on her holidays. We scouted around and then headed north for Clare.
We’d taken a quick look around Lough Gur on an earlier trip so this time we went back for a closer look. This giant stone circle was one of the biggest I’ve seen.
There are so many things to see there. One memorable site is a stone circle with a double ring one inside the other, then a third much smaller ring in the center.
Here’s my low-tech panorama of part of it.
We returned to Lough Gur in 1991; click here for pix of that.
Bunratty Castle
I confess I love these “folk park” places that cater to tourists where they recreate a Viking village or whatever. Bunratty’s specialty is medieval banquets in their well preserved castle. Again, the best part for us was chatting with the bored staff woman. Carole was always great at this.
Craggaunowen
This is another touristy place, but I loved it! The best part was this recreated crannog, which is a dwelling place built up on a lake. They put the buildings up on stilts and build decks between them.
With their thatched roofs and wattle fencing, a crannog was a safe alternative to a ringfort or hillfort. I had always wondered about wattle-and-daub, and this helped me understand how sturdy and weatherproof it could be.
Here’s a great example of how you’d build up a ring of earth and build a palisade along the top. There would be a deep ditch on the other side, making it very difficult to attack.
The Brendan at Craggaunowen
Every year there’s a big discussion in the US about Columbus Day and how he didn’t really “discover” America. Well, certainly he wasn’t the first European to cross the Atlantic. Not only did the Vikings beat him to the draw, but it’s also possible a lone 6th-century Irish monk did too. His name was St. Brendan, and he wrote about how he did it.
In the mid-1970s, a guy named Tim Severin constructed a replica of Brendan’s leather boat (called a currach) and sailed to Canada following the route outlined in the story. His boat is called the Brendan and was made using traditional tools and materials.
Severin wrote a book about it called The Brendan Voyage.
The Brendan is on display at Craggaunowen. It’s mind-bogglingly small. I can’t even imagine that in rough seas.
And we’d just seen the little creek on the north side of Dingle where St. Brendan is said to have set off on his voyage.
Irish composer Shaun Davey wrote an orchestral suite depicting the story. It was the first orchestral piece featuring the uilleann pipes (Irish bagpipes). I was able to attend a performance of it while I was there.
Magh Adair
Magh Adair is a big hillfort in Clare which was covered with thick brambles. This stone was the coronation stone for the kings of Thormond, including Brian Boru.
Ballyhickey dolmen
It’s an unusual shape, nearly square, and unusual stone. To me it looks squat and ugly, unlike most dolmens which seem elegant and beautiful, even the collapsed ones.
Ellie’s dolmen
We were having a pint in Kinvara and saw a poster in the window with a picture of a dolmen, so we decided to track it down. In so doing, we met this lovely woman, who greeted us like we were long-lost family. She insisted we come into her kitchen for tea and cake (which turned out to be bread) and told us her life story. Her name was Ellie McCooke, but her maiden name was Kilkelly. She’d wanted to become a nun and had never wanted to be married. It was an arranged marriage; she’d had no say.
She asked if I had children. I said no, and she replied oh well, you’re not out of the woods yet.
Later her husband came home from the pub (it was a Sunday) somewhat tipsy. He wanted to talk about the Black and Tans and what they did to someone down the road behind their house, but Ellie hushed him. Eventually we went out to see the dolmen.
We had to get back to Dublin and so this was our last adventure for this trip. I had to fly back home in a few days. While I was eager to get back to my husband and home, I was also heartsick wondering if I would ever get back to Ireland again. I felt like I left my heart there.
Click here for more pix from 1991.