Episode 10

David drove us down the shore of Strangford Lough so we got a great view of mud flats and islands that weren't islands when the tide is out as it was. At the southern end we took a small ferry across to the town of Strangford and then to visit Castle Ward. However, when we got to the castle we found that it’s not open during the week until July, and then only from 12noon. They don’t seem to expect people to be out and about early anywhere in Ireland, but here it Ulster they are even later than in the Republic. My humans aren’t early risers but do like to be under way well before 9am.

The plan was to drive through as much of the Mountains of Mourne as possible but it seems there isn’t much in roads through the mountains so it was manly skirting around the bottom of them along the coast. Again we had planned to see one or two thing only to find that they weren’t open. Quite disappointing! Then when we got to Armagh late in the afternoon we walked up to see the Church of Ireland Cathedral where Brian Boru, that fellow who was the first king of all Ireland, is buried, we found that it had closed at 5pm. We did see the mosaics in the Catholic Cathedral. Both of these cathedrals are dedicated to St Patrick and sit on hill tops in the city.

Our route took us around much of Lough Neagh, however we only got a few glimpses of the lough as much of the area near the lough is swamp. We called at a lovely marina where several coach loads of oldies had just arrived and swamped the place. Needless to say we didn’t stay long.

An interesting place and something a little different is Patterson’s Spade Mill. The original building was probably a corn mill and built in the 1700’s, it was also a beetling mill for the processing of linen in the late 1800’s. It had a waterwheel originally, however, that was taken out and a water turbine installed to provide power for the mill. In the 1920’s people by the name of Patterson bought the mill and started making spades here, and now it’s the only surviving spade mill in the world probably, and still powered by the water turbine.

At its peak it made 171 different shaped spades, each one was for a specific purpose, several for cutting peat, and several for preparing land for potatoes and for digging the potatoes. Now only a few designs are made and mostly as demonstrations for visitors. It was interesting to watch these skilled tradesmen at work, I, being the stuffed toy, watched closely but decided it’s not a profession for me, I think I would melt near those high temperatures, then I most certainly would be binned. I liked the weather forecasting equipment outside; three sticks forming a tripod and a rock suspended underneath, and instruction on how to interpret what you see: Wet stone, it’s raining, dry stone, it’s not raining, white stone, it’s snowing, stone swinging, it’s windy, stone missing, tornado:

After a great deal of trouble we eventually found an ancient court tomb L wanted to see but it turned out to be quite disappointing so she says we won’t be looking for any more. It dates back to possibly 4000BC but was used as recently as 400BC. Since the last archaeological dig it has been left to return to nature and is well overgrown again so that we couldn’t get inside to see the chambers. L can only say that the circular court was around 12m in diameter and the tombs extended about 35m from SE to NW.

After visiting several attractions, or at least finding them, only to discover that they don’t open during the week we decided we’d be better off looking at something that was there all the time so we headed up to Malin Head, the most northerly point on the whole of the Irish Island. It had been a fairly wet day but we were lucky and it didn’t rain while we were there so we got to walk right out on the headland where I had to sit very near the edge for a photo, I’m mighty glad the wind wasn’t blowing or it could have been fatal for me, it was a long way down with zilch chance of rescue.

On another drizzly wet day we visited two castles near Enniskillen. Yes, you’re right we are going in circles, we were here over a week ago, but at that time my humans didn’t feel like visiting another castle, now they have a National Trust membership and figure they have to get some value out of it so here we are. These two castles are really 'stately homes’, they were constructed around the same time, possibly by some of the same trades people and in the same style, neo-classical. They do not have any fortifications as real castle do.

The larger is Castle Coole that sits atop a gentle rise with a large expanse of lawn, beyond which in one direction is a wood and in the opposite direction a lough, whilst the other castle has extensive gardens. The furnishings are similar in both places too although Florence Castle has the more elaborate ceilings with some very beautiful stucco mouldings. There has been more restoration work in this castle too as a fire in 1955 destroyed a good bit of the entrance hall and the storeys above it. The National Trust had only taken over the property the year before. The families are also connected since back in the 19th century a daughter of the Earl of Belmont married a son of the Earl of Enniskillen. Also one of the Belmont Earls was a governor of New South Wales for three years around 1860 L thinks it was.

The state bedroom in Castle Coole was especially decorated for the visit of the King of England, however when the King visited the castle he didn’t stay overnight but rushed off someplace to spend the night with his mistress. L says nothing changes:

The present Earl of Enniskillen lives in a small residence near the castle having returned from Kenya upon his father’s death. The Viscount, the present Earl’s son is still in Kenya and it seems unlikely, according to our guide, that he will ever return.

Our castle tours also included visits to the basements of both places to see how the servant lived. It seems to L that those in Florence court had better conditions, although both were damp and musty because there are no fires burning and the big kitchen ranges stand idle and cold. That alone would have produced some heat and a drying influence on the atmosphere. The Castle Coole basement was completely underground with the servants’ entrance to it from a long tunnel that was equally damp and cold. The Florence castle basement has some natural light coming in which must have been at least a little less depressing.

I met some of my peers at Florence Castle, a dolly and two teddies, but where as they have tourists come to them I go forth and meet new people all the time, they really do lead very boring lives compared to me, but then I am a rather special breed.

Back into the Republic again and we visited the Hill of Tara. Atop this hill that commands quite a view are the earth works of what was an ancient earthen fort. In fact there is more than one, over a quite a large area there are many earthworks that go back thousands of years. From the east side of the hill a deep, wide trench leads towards the earthworks as if it was some wide road used for ceremonial occasions. The site was important in prehistory times and also it became the seat of the ancient Kings of Ireland. The Vikings fought to gain control of it in the 9th and 10th centuries and it was the site of a battle in the 1798 uprising. It seems to have played an important role in Irish history for about 4 millennia. There is also a passage tomb here.

There are plenty more passage tombs about too, we visited several sites, Loughcrew, Knowth and Newgrange. The largest is at Knowth, around 85m in diameter, 8m high, with passages going in 40m from the eastern side and nearly as far on the western side. This tomb is aligned to the equinox. Longcrew is aligned to the equinox too, while Newgrange is aligned to the winter solstice. White quartz from the Wicklow mountains about 70k’s away has been used on all the tombs, it completely covered the Loughcrew one so that it used to shine very white well into recorded history. These ancient people had neither the horse nor the wheel so whatever the purpose of these great tombs they must have been very important for so much effort to have been put into their construction. It’s estimated that the larger ones took between 8 and 30 years to build. Another thing about these tombs are the stone carvings, something that we didn’t see in those tombs in the west of the country at Carrowkeel, Carrowmore and other places where the tombs are older than here.

At Knowth there are 17 tombs, the one large one and 16 quite small ones, it took archaeologists 40 years to excavate the complete site and there are many more places still awaiting excavating. The large tomb was used for about 300 years then nothing more for around 1000 years, then again for a few hundred years. In the Iron Age a fort was built on top and succeeding peoples upgraded the fort and altered it as more modern methods developed. The Vikings were here for a while then it was some sort of Christian settlement, and so on. All these different layers were uncovered by the archaeologists.

At Newgrange where the tomb remained relatively undisturbed until modern times it also remained complete dry inside, some feat for something that is about 5000 years old, 500 years older than the pyramids in Egypt so the guides keep telling us. L says she can’t remember that far back:

At the ‘battle of the Boyne’ site we came across a country fair. There was a big marquee set up on the lawn inside of which were a wide variety of stalls offering food tasting so my humans went around and tried just about everything that was on offer and there was a very wide range, mostly locally produced. Local cheeses and sausages, butter with all sorts of herbs and spices added, rape seed oil with all sorts of things added, cakes, biscuits and sweets, and probably best of all a locally made Irish Cream liqueur, similar to Baileys only better because my humans could get to taste it, free:

The battle of the Boyne was a major battle in British history between protestant William of Orange and catholic James 2nd of England who had lost the English crown to William and wanted it back. He lost the battle and never did regain the crown.

Monasterboice was once a very large monastery but now is little more than a grave yard with three of the oldest ‘high’ crosses in Ireland. The crosses date from the 10th century and are in remarkably good condition for their age. The round tower dates from the same period too. The two small churches that are in ruins are from a later date, one 12th cent, the other 14th cent. The grave yard is still in use and our elderly guide has many family members buried here.

Drogheda seems a nice town, it was very busy late on a Saturday afternoon when we made a short visit. A Martello tower up on the hill, a river below and the main part of the town across the stream. Only one of the original ten city gates remain, St Laurence’s gate, and it does cause a traffic congestion, however, with Irish patience and tolerance no-one loses their cool.

More abbeys and castles, each one according to each individual guide made an indelible mark on Irish history. L’s sure they did but they are all beginning to blur into the one congealing mass of grey stone. One of the latest ones was Trim Castle, a 12th century Norman castle with a fairly well preserved keep and a guide who seemed to have the history of the 12th to 14 centuries off pat with matters that concerned this castle and the people connected to it. These old Norman castles had square towers originally, however, after the crusades in the 13th cent and later, those returning from them had learnt that round towers as they had in many parts of the middle east, were more easily defensible and were included in any modifications, along with other ideas for improving defence. Castles were always being added to and altered and evolving as new techniques and guns for bombarding them developed.

Then there was Castletown, which is really a stately home from the 18th century in the Palladian style. L thinks it’s early 18th cent though nothing she read actually stated when it was built, only that it was renovated for a Lady Louisa in 1760. It did have some wonderful Rococco style stucco work on walls and ceilings, but little else to offer except a display of some clothes from the latter part of the 18th century.

Perhaps the nicest of the Stately Homes we visited is Emo Court. Building started here in 1795 and continued well into the 1800’s. It stayed in the one family until around 1920 when that family relocated back to England because of the troubles here. Jesuit Monks bought the house and used it as a Monastery from sometime in the 1920’s until around 1960 when it was sold to some fellow by the name of Harrison for 44000 Irish Punds then he spent a further 5,000,000 punds restoring it. He certainly did a wonderful job of restoration. It is a magnificent house with beautiful stucco work ceilings and parquet flooring. The Jesuits had altered the place but had stored carefully everything they had removed including four very large solid Connemara marble pillars that are now back in their original position in the ballroom/drawing room. No photos allowed inside – sorry!

We drove into the Wicklow mountains. They aren’t all that high and largely covered in blanket bog with not a tree or any building in sight. My humans just loved these mountains, they gave a wonderful feeling of space on this quite crowded island. This place would be fairly bleak in winter even with the sun shining brightly the wind was chilly. The view across the hills and valleys of these mountains is a kaleidoscope of shades of green at the height of summer as it is now with the purple flowering heather just starting to come into bloom

At Glendalough, the glen of two loughs, is the ruins of a monastery that was first established in the 6th century by St Kevin. The oldest ruins here date from the 10th century, the round tower (top restored) and one of the small churches. St Kevin came here to live in a cave above one of the Loughs, however others keep coming to join him so he started building a monastery.

It was a brilliantly sunny warm day, even L didn’t reach for her coat each time she got out of the car, that we drove up along the Wicklow coast. There are some lovely stretches of white sandy beach. Problem is, there is very little public access to the beaches and even less area for people to park their cars on the already very narrow road. Farms lead right down to the water’s edge for much of the coast and from the road we got to see just a few quick snatches of coastline

Everyone that could be out in the sunshine was there. All the open public places were crowded with people having picnics and generally enjoying the good weather, they don’t get that much of it here in Ireland. Plenty of people had a good dose of sunburn too. I get told I’ll fade if I sit in the sun too long.

I knew we were going in circles, I just knew it, we ended up back in Kilkenny again and this time because there seemed to be less people about we visited the interior of the castle.

The interior is similar to how it looked in the 19th century however there are parts that date back to the 12th century. Most of the exterior that we now see is from around the 16th and 17th centuries while the interior kept being updated well into the 19th century. It was owned by the Butler family, the same people how owned Cahir Castle and Swiss cottage that we visited weeks ago. Back in the 1950’s the Butlers sold it to the city of Kilkenny for Fifty Irish Punds. However, the city couldn’t afford to repair and maintain it so they handed it over to the Irish government who set about repairing and refurbishing it. They have done a very good job.

The family donated some paintings and portraits that hang in the lovely gallery, a beautiful room, long and narrow with decorated exposed beams that support the roof. As with most of the castles we have visited, a great deal of time and effort as well as money has been spent of refurbishing these places. Rooms have been redecorated with wall paper to match that of the original usually using fragments that have been found behind a painting of a skirting board. There must be a big business for some specialist companies who match these old fabrics and dyes and make new products to match. Same with the carpet, in this case the receipt for the original was found amongst the papers, it has come from Izmir in Turkey. The company is still in business and still have the pattern on file so they could make the massive new carpet that was need to replace the old. Then there are the pelmets over the windows, in this place they are carved and gilded so a specialist company in Dublin that does gilding scored out, as there were a good number that needed to be replaced. Curtains too needed to be replaced, quite often they are made of silk, and huge windows require vast amounts of material. The wall paper was often silk too, and hand blocked or painted. One thing that has been completely replaced is the glass in the windows and doors, all such places now have special glass to screen out the ultra violet light so as to preserve the old furnishings and the ultra expensive replacement ones for as long as possible.

Out in the garden while I was sitting on the steps waiting for D to take a photo of me and the castle I was approached by a professional photographer who wanted my photo. Of course I accepted graciously; What else could I do?

When we visited another cave, Dunmore Cave, our guide told us he used to play in the cave as a child in the 1950’s, he’s of a similar vintage to my humans. When the ‘experts’ tell him that the stalactites and stalagmites grow at 1cm per 100 years he shows them a photo he took in 1958 of one particular pair that are easily seen by visitors, in less than 60 years they have grown about 2cm.

Unlike most tourist caves this one has a long history. It has been known about since ancient times and the Vikings are responsible for the many skeletons that were found in the cave, the result of some battle in 928AD with people from the rings forts in this area. D tried to take a few photos down here but they didn't come out.

We travelled around the Blackstairs mountains near Mt Leinster and walked up a gentle path to a lookout that gave us a wonderful view over the surrounding countryside that is a patchwork of fields with golden ripening barley and lush green pastures, separated by hedges or stone walls.

A lovely stretch of while sandy beach stretches along the coast just north of Wexford and although the weather wasn't quite as good as it had been there was still many people out enjoying their summer break.

And so our travels in Ireland are coming to an end. L booked us on the late ferry from Rosslare to Fishguard. When we rolled up to drive onto the ferry and bid farewell to Ireland I’m sure I saw a tear or three in L’s eyes, I know that she in particular had thoroughly enjoyed her time here, as for D, well he doesn’t say much about anything so who knows:

© Lynette Regan 3rd July 2014