This page includes my journals for a ten-day visit I took with my parents, Alan and Julian Williams, to Ireland in May of 2003. I haven't figured out how to add photos yet, but I will!

Julian and Alan and Sean’s Excellent Adventures in Ireland!

5/10 and 11 – This was a travel day for all of us; in my case, it was characterized by one of the engines on my plane not firing just before take-off, taxiing back to the gate, getting off, and eventually taking a night flight to London. Anyway, I DID get there eventually, and picked up the rental car before picking up Mom and Dad. We went off to the cash machine where brand new euros came zipping out. What a revelation! I am still trying to get my brain around the idea that you can use the same money all over the European Union. Evidently the coins are locally made (and “decorated”) with country-specific symbols, like American state quarters. Ireland’s, of course, have a harp on the back.

I drove us out of Dublin south to a lovely place called Rathsallagh House, where we drove in on a looooooooong driveway through a stunning golf course. It was surely the hunting grounds of the old estate. Now I know what the rest of Ireland looked like before it was deforested by the English: giant stands of oak, birch, pine, you name it. It took our breath away. I could hear the hounds barking and imagine horses galloping through the fields. Our room was in a newer wing; it was large, with a king sized bed and (I must say this) a pathetic hide-a-bed sofa with a thin mattress. Our room looked out on a slight hill where there were a few cows grazing. The weather was surprisingly nice that evening. Dinner was incredible: we had beef (a rare occurrence for all of us, I think), an amazing tart of gruyère and asparagus (the highlight of the meal, really), chocolate torte, and sorbet. The bread that came with our meal was extraordinarily delicious; we wanted to try all the varieties in the basket! You have to remember that we were trying hard to stay awake at the table. I caught Mom leaning forward at least once, and I know that I had my elbow on the table and was supporting my head on my hand for at least part of the meal.

After dinner we decided to go for a walk on the beautiful grounds. We meandered along trails, noting the wildflowers, and saw pairs of bunnies cavorting – and they really do cavort! – here and there. It was gorgeous. But much better than what it looked like was what it sounded like: the birds were riotous and musical and everywhere. This was about 9 pm, close to twilight, and everywhere we turned we heard the sounds of chirping and singing. It was like an aviary outdoors that went on and on. Our walk really pulled us together. The room had one of those “rainstorm” shower heads, whatever they’re called, and it was blissful to stand in a roomy shower under such a delightful downpour of warm water.

5/12 – Of course we woke up quite early! The sun is up plenty early in Ireland at this time of the year. We had a delicious breakfast with fruit and homemade muesli in addition to the usual enormous Irish breakfast of bacon, eggs, sausage, cheese, ham, yogurt, croissants, etc. Okay, we didn’t have all that much meat, but it’s available. We did have the cheese, though. Each place has its own locally-made cheese, and each one is heavenly and unique. We went for a quick walk in the morning, back out toward the road on the golf course, and the birds were out in full force again. What a joy! Then we packed up and headed over Wicklow Gap to visit Glendalough, the home of St. Kevin. The gap itself was stunning, with views from here to there and back. We could see the ocean! Right at the top we stopped at a place (where there were gale-force winds) and saw part of St. Kevin’s Way, the path that has been used for centuries as a pilgrimage trail. There was a beautiful stream pouring alongside down toward Glendalough. The road down there had its challenging moments (not for the last time!), especially whenever a bus came by.

Glendalough itself is certainly one of the most-visited sites in all of Ireland. Its proximity to Dublin makes it a tourist magnet. Basically, it was the home of St. Kevin, who lived in the 5th century. The buildings date from the 8th to the 12th century, and the place was a major monastic site for about 600 years. It is one of the best preserved of the ancient monastic settlements, although it was raided by the Vikings; the round tower is spectacular! Glendalough – and all other major archaeological sites – also houses a stunning visitor center, courtesy of European Union funding. My favorite part was the exhibition of ancient dyes and artifacts; I loved it. We laughed at the audio/visual part, where a voice solemnly instructed us about St. Kevin’s role in bringing about Ireland’s recovery from (I’m not joking here) “the darkness of pagan idolatry.” I actually wrote it down, I was so stunned. So we were wandering around, marveling at the round tower and the old gorgeous roofless cathedral, when one of us (Mom, I think) turned and noticed that the sky to the west had turned utterly black. This was not good news. We began walking quickly toward the car, and within thirty seconds the enormous drops started coming down. Dad and I took off running for the car, which we reached in about four minutes, and Mom followed us, having headed toward another car first. We were breathless!

I haven’t yet mentioned that Mom and Dad had packed for Spain, not for Ireland, meaning windbreakers, not coats or heavy sweaters. So they were not comfortable. The airlines had temporarily lost my bag, which had my coat (I won’t bore you with the details, but trying to get the bag back was a major pain for all of us). We found a woolen mill nearby with some very nice sweaters for sale. I dragged Mom to the back where the sale goods were, and she found a fine cable-knit sweater, dark green, for an excellent price. Dad found a cap that fits him perfectly and looks great – as if it’s been a favorite of his for years. So that solved the problem expeditiously.

We then took off back over the Wicklow Gap and made it to the freeway, lunching in Kildare at a pub/restaurant called “Silken Thomas.” And I haven’t yet found out who “Silken Thomas” was, but I sure saw his name around in various places. Hmm. You should have seen the piles of smoked salmon heaped on our plates! There was enough on one plate to feed the three of us, but Dad and I had each ordered one and it was more than we could possibly eat. Mom had a club sandwich (with Irish bacon, which is really closer to ham, I think). Lemonade, in Ireland, is either Lemon Schweppes or Sprite. In fact, in a couple of places we asked if they had lemonade, and they brightly answered “Yes! Sprite!” Anyway, Kildare is the center of Irish thoroughbred breeding country (its sister city, not surprisingly, is Lexington, Kentucky). Everywhere around there you see huge estates with a sign saying “So-and-So’s Stud Farm.” We didn’t see many racehorses, but we did see some of the Traveling People’s horses, big old Eastern European-style horses with shaggy fur in several shades and thick, strong legs. (The Traveling People are sometimes called Tinkers or Gypsies – they’re Ireland’s major underclass and they live in clusters of trailer parks outside of towns. They’re also – unfairly, for the most part – blamed for virtually all of Ireland’s crime and corruption.)

En route to our place for that evening, we stopped in the town of Cashel to see the famous Rock of Cashel, another major monastic settlement. It’s in Tipperary, which was, um, a long way. The place was once the site of the High Kings of Ireland (starting in the 5th century), and was a religious center for over a thousand years until the infamous English bad guy Oliver Cromwell destroyed it and its 3,000 inhabitants in 1647. I’m not kidding about Cromwell – his name is mud and forever will be. Irish concepts of time (cyclical, not linear) have placed the whole conquest into a perpetual time loop so that the Famine happened yesterday and the conquest happened last week.

Back to Cashel. The wind was howling! We staggered up an incredibly steep road to get to the entrance, and found ourselves on a dazzling hilltop with expansive views in all directions. The former chapel (now the site of the ubiquitous A/V presentation) had the most beautiful ceiling. I was taking pictures with Mom’s camera because mine was still in my lost bag, and I tried to get some good ones of the ceiling. Cormac’s Chapel is the highlight of the Rock of Cashel; it included gargoyles, color paint (faded but still evident!), extraordinary Romanesque carvings on the door lintels, and intricate carvings in stone. We also saw the first-ever example of the famous interlacing Celtic designs carved into stone (the kind that is now synonymous with Celtic art).

By this time it was 4:30 in the afternoon of an already-long day, so we drove like bats out of hell to get past Cork and down to Clonakilty before dinnertime. Well, after getting lost numerous times we ended up at Dunmore House Hotel. It is set on a cliff overlooking the Atlantic on Ireland’s south coast. The weather was clear! Unfortunately, in Ireland renting a “non-smoking” room means that you don’t smoke in your room, not that the room doesn’t get smoked in. We were practically choking on stale air, but we were able to open the windows. The restaurant in the hotel didn’t look like it had opening for the season yet, so with serious misgivings we ordered “bar food,” which included great wine and an excellent soup and salad combination. A man at the lobby table next to ours recommended that we take Healy Pass the next day on our way north, so we made note of it (and now we’re glad we did!). We boiled all night under down comforters and on top of rubberized sheets.

5/13 – All three of us woke up at 4:30, just before sunrise. You could see practically to Africa from there! It was gloriously clear, cool, and breathtaking. We walked around outside waiting for breakfast to be ready, and were followed around by a large St. Bernard dog. You could see cormorants out in the water, fishing and splashing wildly to get airborne again. Breakfast had the best croissants I’d ever had – so very delicate and perfect! The breakfast room was done in a cool cobalt blue with white accents; it surprised me at how welcoming it seemed and how pleasant it felt to be in that deep blue. Right after breakfast we drove over to the Lios na gCon ringfort, about five miles away. It was one of 30,000 ringforts in Ireland, but this one has been restored with souterrain passages, sleeping places with luxuriously soft piles of wool to sleep on (and under), storage places, and a small garden. I went down into one of the souterrains; it was mighty small but would be a good hiding place. There was a handful of deer wandering about the place, but no one watching the gate except for a radio blaring sports scores. On our way back through Clonakilty, we stopped in again at the Dunmore House Hotel and the airlines had finally delivered my bag. Hooray! Mom had been graciously lending me underwear and shirts each day, and I was ready to have a ritual burning of my clothes at that point. But I was overjoyed to have my coat and camera and all the other necessities.

We drove out to the Drombeg (druim=ridge, beag=little) stone circle near Clonakilty. What a place. It has an altar stone over which the sun rises on midsummer’s morning, and the remnants of a cooking area where you could boil water in 18 minutes and keep it hot for three hours! (they tested this out and it was true). We took plenty of pictures; it was beautiful and secluded and – not being a “major” site, just a prehistoric stone circle like a small version of Stonehenge, that’s all – did not include an E.U. voice-over warning us about the darkness of pagan idolatry. I was so happy to have my camera that I took at least half a roll of pictures.

In Bantry (a lovely small port town on the southwest coast) we stopped for the most delicious mussels at O’Connell’s Seafood, right downtown. They were simply soaked in butter and herbs, and of course one couldn’t let the butter go to waste, could one? The whole southwest seemed to be having a mussel festival; there were signs everywhere. I didn’t mention that I was periodically providing a soundtrack of local songs during the trip – I’d forgotten how many songs deal with towns (or people) of the Irish southwest! Mom and Dad were patient (and captive) listeners.

We had a learning experience about bogs shortly after lunch. I knew there was a standing stone not too far off the road, so we took a tiny dirt road uphill to get to it. Thank goodness we didn’t run into anyone driving in our direction, because there would have been no way to get out! We got to the top of the hill, more or less, and could see the standing stone out there right on the edge looking out toward Bantry Bay. It seemed like the easiest thing to simply take the obvious trail straight across and see the stone up close. Well! Down we went, up to our ankles in water! And this bog was on a slope, for cryin’ out loud! It was precisely like stepping on an incredibly full sponge. Every step brought water up. We jumped from hillock to hillock, standing on tufts of bog grass and utterly failing in staying dry. The standing stone was about ten feet tall with a cross edged deeply into its back. Heading back was a little easier; the clouds were coming fast, so we had good reason to hurry. When we jumped back in the car and headed back down, it started to rain, and there was a sign for a wedge tomb. Well, I couldn’t resist a chance to see a wedge tomb, so I dashed up the hill, and up the hill, and up the hill….and never found it. We climbed back in the car and got back on the main road (this whole experience was actually really funny) and headed north toward Kenmare, cursing wedge tombs.

Healy Pass was stunning. It was like Alaska and alpine Montana and Ireland and Iceland combined. It’s a barren pass on the Beare peninsula, with huge slabs of stone, waterfalls and streams everywhere, and it was covered with wildflowers (and a few sheep). Everywhere we looked there were new and gorgeous views. We stopped at a little restaurant/shop at the top of the pass and had coffee/tea and homemade carrot cake. It was a wonderful detour that was well worth the time and energy. When we had recovered from that portion of the drive, we went down toward Killarney.

Killarney is another one of Ireland’s famous tourist destinations, and normally it is simply choked with traffic. But, like everywhere else on our trip, it wasn’t the high season yet, so we saw a charming town with a breathtaking set of lakes and a pleasant drive to get around them. Having seen the beautiful Healy Pass, we had no reason, really, to go around the famed “Ring of Kerry” (a seaside route that would have taken us all afternoon, if not a whole day). Instead, we stopped in at Muckross House and Gardens, a dazzling estate with rhododendrons like you’ve never seen. They were not just garage-sized; they were house-sized. And they were ALL in bloom: purples, reds, whites, oranges, yellows, pinks. We felt positively Lilliputian wandering through them, open-mouthed, saying “Oh my! Oh my!” They towered thirty feet overhead. It was extraordinary. Muckross House itself was closed, but that was fine by me – the gardens were plenty to see. You have to understand that at every minute of these few days (and indeed, most of the trip) it was either threatening to rain, was pouring, or had just finished raining but wasn’t sure that it was ready to stop. We headed north again, and in a short time we were pulling into the driveway for Ballyseede Castle in Tralee.

The castle itself had a relatively small “footprint,” for a castle. It seemed compact. It was all decorated in Victorian style, and our room was large and pleasant with a view of a solid bank of purple rhododendrons in the back. We had chicken in a basil plum sauce, salmon in Hollandaise sauce, and we split an order of profiteroles for dessert. Oh my! It was sooooo good. After dinner we went for a walk and visited the horses of the owner’s children (you could tell because there were pictures in the drawing room of said children and horses, show jumping and such). It was a thrill for me to have them come galloping right over when I whistled to them. I was sorry that I had nothing to offer except a scratch for their ears. We wandered along the road and into a cemetary, watched the sun set, and (still jet-lagged) fell asleep early.

5/14 – What a gorgeous day!! The orange juice at breakfast was a little “off,” but otherwise it was another fabulous Irish breakfast with sausage and eggs along with all the other delights. At Tralee we stopped to get gas (for the first time!); the fellow at the gas station grinned at us said “Are ye lost or are ye found?” He told us how to go up Conor Pass to get to the Dingle peninsula, where we planned to spend the morning. Well. Conor Pass is not for the faint-of-heart. I would describe it as “desperate,” in fact. It was a one-lane road on the side of a mountain, with tiny pull-outs for when cars were coming your way. We had at least a dozen white-knuckle moments where we were sure that the other car was going to scrape us or push us off the road or something. When we got to the top of the pass we staggered out of the car and joined a number of other very relieved-looking people who had survived the drive to the top. There was a harpist playing up there! I felt like I’d made it through purgatory, all right. Anyway, looking waaaaay down from there we could see a stunning ancient settlement that we couldn’t have driven to (or walked to, without taking six hours down and fifteen to get back up). It was beautiful, with a stone church, rings of stones, and the outlines of various structures. Getting down was easier, though we felt sorry for the red-faced, puffing bicyclists trying to make their way up to the top.

Dingle is a pretty coastal town with lots of interesting little shops. It has grown tremendously since I was last there (in 1982!). We had hoped to stop for lunch there, but we set out to go around the Dingle Peninsula and it took much longer than I expected. Besides, I got a “little bit” lost and we had to backtrack a couple of times to get to where we were going. The Dingle peninsula is the location of probably the most numerous prehistoric structures and sites in all of Ireland. We visited the famous (and rightly famous as the best-preserved ancient church in Ireland) structure called the Gallarus Oratory, which looks like an overturned ship. It’s made entirely of unmortared stone and has been waterproof inside since about the 7th century. It uses dry-stone corbelling, a Neolithic technique that stayed on in Ireland – and people still know how to do it even now. Of course we watched the A/V presentation and learned more about the church: Catholic/good, pagans/really bad. We then found the church of KillMalkedar (cill=church). It has a stone with alphabet and ogham markings on it, which functioned as a type of Rosetta stone to help later scholars translate the ogham symbols (which are horizontal and slanted slashes along the edges of standing stones). It also has a sundial and a ruined chapel with Romanesque lintels (done in imitation of Cormac’s Chapel at the Rock of Cashel). There was a nearby ruined house from about the same time. Later we stopped by the settlement of Riasc, also 7th century, with its standing stones and beautiful stone walls.

We were beginning to notice how hungry we were, which is unusual considering how much we ate and ate and ate on the entire trip, so we stopped in at the Blasket Island Centre way out at the end of the peninsula. I had wanted to go there anyway, but it had a nice café where we had smoked salmon sandwiches and a chicken wrap. The Blaskets, just offshore, are known as the home of some of Ireland’s most famous writers in the Irish language, especially Peig Sayers and Tomás Ó Criomthain. At least 18 of the island’s people became renowned writers! So the center (thanks again to the European Union) has gorgeous displays and views of the islands, information about the language, and a little bookshop. I was listening to the CD playing over the loudspeakers, and asked about it at the bookshop. The friendly, garrulous woman who ran it said that she simply couldn’t bear it – they played it too often and she didn’t like the old music anyway. She did a funny imitation of old-style singing, too! I couldn’t stop smiling and cheering her on. It was great! We did buy the CD after all, along with some fantastic natural history and archaeological books.

On our way back toward Dingle we passed the Fahan group of prehistoric beehive-shaped huts. We got out of the car and went inside them; they average about eight or nine feet in height and ten feet in diameter. We also saw a couple of dolmens (a cluster of three or four broad standing stones with a flat rock placed on top), and stopped in at the Dúnbeg fort (dún=fort, beag=little), with its perfectly square room and breathtaking view of the water. The wildflowers all day were one marvel after another. This was the clearest, most breathtaking day of our whole trip – not a cloud in the sky, and only the most gentle of breezes. We slipped and slid a bit on the steep path down to the fort, and Dad cheerfully said “Isn’t it amazing that Ireland has no disabled people?!” Seriously, you’d think there wasn’t a wheelchair in the country, from the way most places have zero accommodation for disabled people. We noticed that repeatedly throughout the trip.

By the time we got back to Dingle, it was well into the afternoon and we had to make a break for the north before it got to be too late. We reached the ferry at Talbert, having missed the previous one by half an hour, and after a short crossing it was time to drive like a bat out of hell again. A man on the ferry said it was best to take the country roads instead of the main roads, so we flew (at a rip-roaring fifty-five miles an hour, felt like eighty) past sheep and horses and tractors and farmers, barely scraping our way through little towns like Lisdoonvarna and Ennistymon. Even bigger towns have people parked on both sides of the streets and in the driving lanes, so it’s a miracle that more cars aren’t scraped up. As we got further away from the coast, the land became drier and less boggy, and soon we were in the Burren, a district of Ireland said to look like the surface of the moon. It is solid rock and wildflowers, hundreds of limestone caves, and unearthly. Literally.

We arrived at Gregan’s Castle House 15 minutes before their kitchen closed, exhausted and looking like the end of pea time. It is a gorgeous manor set at the foot of “Corkscrew Hill,” where a winding road takes you up to one of the top viewpoints in the Burren. Birds were chorusing all over the place. Our table in the dining room was in a glassed-in area with several kinds of saxifrage and other flowers – all in full bloom – outside. We started with spring rolls with peanut sauce for Mom and Dad; I had mussel/prawn vol au vent. There was a yogurt mousse with raspberry coulis for the sorbet course. Dinner was salmon and beef with truffle jus and excellent California-style vegetables (done just right, not overdone). Dessert for me was banana and kahlua steam pudding; Mom had three kinds of ice cream. They told us that they had no decaffeinated coffee after dinner, although they did have decaf tea. As it turns out, there was indeed decaf, but it’s still so new in Ireland that it’s very expensive. Dad overheard a conversation from the kitchen the next morning about how serving decaf was tantamount to throwing money away. I remember when coffee was still considered odd there.

Our room was a luxurious suite! It was huge, with a separate room for reading and talking on the phone, views into the garden and out onto the Burren, a nicely-appointed bathroom, and comfortable beds. We sat outside for half an hour, just listening to the birds singing as twilight deepened. The stars were a little hazy, but you could look way across the Burren and see the occasional lone car’s headlights turning and turning as it went up the hill of stone. What a joy to be in such a nice room!

5/15 – Well! We woke up to rain, rain, rain. Breakfast was a warm croissant, decaf coffee (different waitperson…), local cheese, and all the usual deliciousness of an Irish breakfast. We were back in the pretty glass sunroom. In the drawing room there was a beautiful (old!) puzzle made from hexagonal ceramic tiles; the painting on the tiles was of a sailing ship. It was wonderful! I’d never seen anything like it. We drove to the Ailwee Caves, not far from there, and took a tour with a French tour guide. Her accent was charming: “be shyoor to watch your ‘ead.” The caves included the remains of a prehistoric bear bed, waterfalls, and some columns, stalagtites and stalagmites. After that we drove to the Poulnabrone dolmen, a 5,000 year old dolmen surrounded by wildflowers and accessible by clambering over deeply-fissured stones. Mom found an odd-looking twisted metal element; we have no idea what it was.

We then drove to the cliffs of Moher in the driving rain and howling wind. It was daunting to even think of getting out of the car, but we couldn’t see the cliffs from the road and you’ve simply got to see the cliffs of Moher when you’re right there. So out we went, pathetic little umbrellas no match at all for the horrendous job ahead of them. We followed the path out to the cliffs, with the wind whipping our clothes and the umbrellas pinning against our bodies. Mom and I took refuge against a 14th century Norman tower and could barely stand up from laughing so hard at the sight of Dad struggling with his umbrella, which looked like it was pushing him back toward the edge. Of course there were fences (also new since I was last there in 1982), and I know we looked just as funny, but we were at least temporarily in a position of luxury, out of the wind. I think the funniest part was that as each of us rounded the tower and faced the wind again, there was a tremendous “whomp!” as the wind and rain struck the umbrella. By the time we got to the car we were soaked entirely. Mom and I had noticed that our jeans were going to be completely wet in the back as we were walking out toward the cliffs, not realizing at the time that the rain would have ample opportunity to soak the front as well. It cost three euros simply to park! Sheesh. We got to the tollbooth and I teased the guy there about not having provided us with better weather (my out-of-control hair made me look like I was wearing a fright wig at that point). He actually took me seriously for a second! Finally he figured it out and promised to do better next time.

We stopped in at Ballyvaughan (at the north end of the Burren) for lunch at O’Brien’s pub, where I stayed with my two colleagues Patrick and Chris in 2001. It was confirmation day, don’t you know, so they could serve us only hot pea soup with “lemonade.” We sat on our wet butts and tried to dry out, watching the kids in their little confirmation suits trying to behave in one of the nearby booths. We shot through Galway (which is too bad, in a way, because Galway can be such a nice town with its walking streets and bookstores) and stopped at the craft cooperative in Spideal. I had really enjoyed visiting there before in 1998; this time, however, it was kind of bleak and the crafts weren’t special. It was too bad, because we had wanted to do some shopping and this didn’t really count as “shopping.” The leather place was particularly good, however; a high point. I got a fine brown tooled (Celtic design) belt for myself and a black one for Cary (which, so far, he has worn every day since I returned!).

We arrived at Ballinahinch Castle in Recess, way out in remotest Connemara. Connemara is also generally bog country, but on this estate there were big forests (again, we saw what happens when you don’t deforest the countryside), a fine river, giant rhododendrons, and walking trails. We had plenty of time to relax in the “Maharajah Room” (the castle was owned for awhile by an Indian maharajah); the room had a canopy bed and big paintings of said maharajah. Dad sent for wine, and we sat on loveseats looking out over the castle ramparts into the forest and rhododendrons and pouring rain. But the rain was so much nicer when viewed from inside! Dinner included more wine and was set in a beautiful dining room. Dad had fresh crab, Mom had mushrooms, and I had a terrine of goat cheese, basil pesto, and sweet peppers. The soup was cream of carrot and fresh thyme. Mom and Dad (both, I think) had monkfish sautéed with eggplant and soft red peppers and broiled tomato. I had salmon with fennel. There was also turnip and carrot purée and potato croquettes. Dessert was ice cream in a kind of tulip shaped container, and I had strawberry cheesecake.

5/16 – There were beautiful views from the dining room, and we sat by the window at breakfast looking out over the river and the flowers. After breakfast we couldn’t resist taking a long walk through the grounds, over a weir on the river, meandering through the forest and rhododendrons. It was stunning. There was a little island in the middle of the river that we walked around. We all felt very relaxed, at least partly because the previous day hadn’t taken us all day to drive from one place to the next, and we had less of a sense of “gotta go!” at that point. We drove around through Connemara, where Joe Heaney, my Irish singing teacher, was from. It was an emotional experience for me; I had so many Irish-language songs going through my head all morning. We went through Clifden, way out on the end of the Connemara peninsula, and shopped a bit. Everyone was speaking Irish, including the teenagers. In fact, I heard more Irish being spoken on this trip than in all previous trips combined. We ended up at Ashcroft Castle in Cong (County Mayo, God help us!), where all the stars and crew of John Wayne’s “The Quiet Man” stayed during the filming of the movie. It’s the kind of castle where you can’t even go inside unless you’re a registered guest, so we couldn’t get lunch there. So we went to a place called “The Hungry Monk” in Cong and had excellent panini sandwiches: brie and tomato, as I recall. In the afternoon we skirted Galway again and went to Clonmacnoise, one of Ireland’s major ancient religious sites. What a place! We went to the obligatory A/V presentation, but the real draw for me was the set of Celtic crosses! They are carved with Biblical stories and allegorical scenes. They are also among the very best examples of Celtic crosses in Ireland. Unfortunately, the ones at Clonmacnoise didn’t include my favorite (at another monastery), which depicts a bagpiper standing on the backs of two cats! You can’t say those stone carvers didn’t have a sense of humor.

Clonmacnoise is on the banks of the Shannon river, which is on a floodplain. We were surprised that the banks are “uncontrolled.” The monastery’s location on the Shannon made it an endless target for Viking raids, unfortunately, but the round towers were wonderful to see and I loved looking at the fragments of ancient writing in the visitor’s center. At the bookstore across the way I picked up some more archaeological books, as well as directions to Kinnitty Castle, our lodging for that evening. “Kinnitty Castle, is it?” We were intrigued by what was clearly an ancient stone structure enclosed in a ringfort right next to Clonmacnoise. There was no information about it, and we got the distinct impression that it was unlabeled because it would have detracted from the religious significance of Clonmacnoise. I pointed it out to Dad, including the ringfort, and he pointed out that we were ourselves standing on an outer earthen ring! It was extraordinary!

By following the directions given by the woman in the bookshop, we made our way on small country roads over to Kinnitty Castle, “welcoming guests since 1209,” as the sign pointed out. It was gloriously castle-like and gothic in a sort of 19th century vampire-tale-spooky way! We wound through labyrinthine passages and up narrow staircases to get to our room, on the top floor with a view out to there. Our ceiling had huge brown wooden beams against white walls, and the turret of the castle enclosed our bathroom! The tub was in the exact center of the hexagonal turret, and we could see everything without being seen. The bed was covered with a red canopy and comprised two double beds with down comforters. What a marvelous place. At dinner there was a woman who simply couldn’t stop smoking. She smoked between bites and lit a cigarette for each new course, holding her cigarette at the window and puffing desperately. Later, after it had started raining again, I saw her sitting alone outside, puffing away for all she was worth.

We went for a walk after dinner and discovered that there was a wedding party going on! You could hear the band playing and the sound of many cheery voices, and there were dressed up children scurrying to and fro. We went in back of the house to where the old stables had been (which was actually very interesting) and came upon a stone circle near one of the outbuildings. Yes, just another ol’ stone circle. I couldn’t believe it. In spite of the castle’s reputation for being one of the haunted castles in Ireland, I slept like I’d been struck. It was wonderful.

5/17 – By breakfast time we were convinced that we were eating our way through half of Ireland’s local cheeses and butters. And it was heavenly every step of the way! We headed off toward Newgrange, an archaeological site built 500 years before the pyramids of Egypt (5,200 years ago). It’s on a hilltop in County Meath and is renowned for being a major pilgrimage and burial site; it also has a number of “satellite” mounds nearby, most of which have yet to be excavated. Because it is close to Dublin it is regularly overwhelmed with visitors, and because we went on a Saturday it was crowded. However, we took a number, had lunch (surprisingly good!), and wandered through the visitor center, watching the A/V presentation and learning about prehistoric (as opposed to early Christian) Ireland. I enjoyed the place very much, and had wanted so much to see it in my previous trips, but hadn’t yet made it there.

In spite of the threatening rain, we lined up for the tour with Paddy, our guide from Drogheda. He explained about the place (sort of the barest minimum explanation, at about a third grade level) and made many references to “last night’s fun” and partying and drinking. Sigh. Being inside the monument (a giant earthen mound) was thrilling! You could see the really old old designs, including chevrons, spirals, waves, etc. In ancient times, the sun would shine through the long passageway at dawn on mid-winter morning and illuminate the entire inside. Now, because the position of the earth has shifted, it doesn’t work quite as well, but I’ve seen video footage of it and it’s still spectacular. By the time we got back outside, the rain was coming down in sheets. My umbrella from Kyoto, which had been bent and twisted by the winds at the cliffs of Moher, was in worse and worse shape and I finally discarded it just as the sun came out.

We drove to Dublin and at one point the rain was coming down so hard that I almost had to stop in the middle of the freeway. Cars were crawling along. We dropped off the rental car at an odd, barely-marked location, and took a taxi into the center of town to the Shelbourne Hotel, Dublin’s primary place to see and be seen for the last 100 years. The lobby was filled with little “brides of Christ” all dressed up for confirmation. We were guessing that confirmation lasts about a week with various events. Anyway, I went off to have dinner with Liam Mac Con Iomaire (a writer) who, the directory assistance lady noted with surprise, is “famous.” Of course, while he and his wife and I were having dinner (LOTS of red wine, lamb, mussels, rhubarb cobbler, brandy and songs after dinner), I told her all about the “famous” comment and they had a big laugh over it. Mom and Dad had dinner at the hotel and were understandably asleep when I crept in at midnight. And whereas the castles and manors we had stayed in were stone quiet in the countryside, the Shelbourne Hotel and downtown Dublin were anything but quiet. You could hear horses clip-clopping by all night, teenagers laughing and talking in the streets, and cars zipping past. I crept out again at 6 am and caught my (uneventful) flight back home. Mom and Dad stayed for two more days, taking the “Dublin Tour” and visiting the National Museum. I wish I could have stayed on!