Inishmore Cottage among fields
An island cottage among fields along the Galway Bay coast, the twelve pins of Connemara beyond.
Notice the playhouse, a replica of the larger cottage.
Time and Hands
From the heights of Dun Aonghasa the karst, a type of limestone, of Inishmore falls away for the sight of the twelve pins against Galway Bay. These unworked, barren slopes have a pale green covering growing seemingly on air.
On approach to Dun Aonghasa, Cottage Road dips closer to the road for this view of a field with enough dense grass for five cows to feed, the rest on the cushioning green. Where did this come from?
The answer is simple hard work, hundreds, a thousand years of hauling seaweed and sand, mixing it on the barren limestone, allowing the rot of time to work. Hold it down with roots, till and refresh.
Beware of falling rock
From the commanding location of Dun Aonghasa, looking northeast across Inishmore island, we can understand why the ancient builders chose this location.
We also see the transition from exposed limestone to the fields built literally from the ground up (see my post “The How of Soil”). For a closer view of island houses see my posts “Settled In” and “Cottage Road Cottage.”
The field walls are described in my posts, “What is a rock, what is a stone?” and “Stone on Stone.”
Click the photograph for a larger view. Enjoy!!
Breaking waves below the dramatic cliffs of the ancient fort Dun Aonghasa (Dun Aengus),
in the distance the karst landscape of Inishmore with clouds of an approaching storm over Galway Bay.
A crack in the limestone foretells the next cliff erosion, “don’t step there!!.”
Inishmore, Aran Islands, County Galway, Ireland.
a storm threatens
In a previous post, “Inner Ring, at last” we passed over the entrance to the inner enclosure.
A long path through fields, karst landscapes and outer walls leads to this entrance to the inner ring of Dun Aonghasa (Dun Aengus) of Inishmore, Aran Islands, County Galway, Ireland. The image composition is as a dramatic landscape with the surrounding walls and the cloudscape of an approaching storm.
Reference: wikipedia Dún Aonghasa
A time of wildflowers
My previous post, “Inner Ring, at last”, lowered the horizon. Here, we study the base of the inner wall.
A detail of the interior wall of Dun Aonghasa (Dun Aengus) in springtime. White flowers of Sea Campion (Scientific Name: Silene uniflora) (Irish Name: Coireán mara) set against the ancient dry stone wall. Inishmore, Aran Islands, County Galway, Ireland.
We found Sea Campion throughout the west Ireland coast.
Wishing a blessed All Saints Day (November 1st) for all my readers.
Reference: wikipedia Dún Aonghasa, Sea Campion
Site of earliest construction, 1,100 BC
A view to the northwest from within Dun Aonghasa in springtime. The interior a karst formation (see my post, ” Galway Bay View from Dún Aonghasa”), the grikes filled with grass and a sprinkling of white and yellow flowers, a cloudscape rising over the walls. Inishmore, Aran Islands, County Galway, Ireland.
Reference: wikipedia Dún Aonghasa
where the wildflowers grow
The exposed limestone of the Aran Islands here transitions to a fertile field of grass, husbanded by generations of islanders. Photograph was taken from the path on Inishmore leading up to Dun Aonghasa.
The Aran Islands are an extension of The Burren of Ireland’s Counties Claire and Galway. The word burren is from the Irish Boireann, meaning “great rock.” The glaciers that covered Ireland, retreating about 10,000 years ago, scraped down to the bedrock, exposing wide areas of limestone and dropping, here and there, large rocks. When people came along the foreign nature of the large rocks was recognized, all the more obvious for lying on the horizontally bedded, exposed limestone. We call the foreign rocks erratics. The underlying scoured rock is a pavement for a resemblance to a cobbled roadway.
The incised line, filled with grass and wildflowers, in the following photograph is called a gryke. The body of stone between the grykes are clints. Sometimes, the grykes are cross hatched and the clints resemble cobblestones or flat paving stones.
The view is northeast toward the 12 Bens of Connemara. Inishmore, Aran Islands, County Galway, Ireland
Click the photograph for a larger view.
References: search wikipedia “The Burren” and Google “gryke”, “clint.”
A modern path to Dún Aonghasa offers views of the karst landscape, walled fields, and the North Atlantic Ocean in Inishmore, County Galway, Ireland.
Modern stonework borders the 1/2 mile path to the inner Dún Aonghasa walls, keeping tourists off delicate plants, maintaining the integrity of this ancient site.
The view north, northwest over the walled path to Dun Aonghasa (Dun Aengus) looking across karst landscape, walled fields, farms, the North Atlantic Ocean, coast of Connemara and the 12 Bens (12 Pins) mountains. Aran Islands, County Galway, Ireland.
Click the photograph for a larger view.
References: search wikipedia “Dún Aonghasa.”
Nine videos taken the same morning, February 5, 2022
A multi-day hatch of small fry around the time of a new moon triggered this Black Skimmers (scientific name: Rynchops niger) feeding behavior surf off Cocoa Beach, Brevard County on Florida’s Atlantic Coast.
The bicycle rental place got the short end…unfortunately.
Admittedly, I over-planned the Ireland trip. For every day possible the venues were pre-booked and paid. In theory planning provides more flexibility when life interrupts.
For the Inishmore planning, a perfect day, for me, was tooling around on a bicycle stopping where we pleased with welcome exercise in between. That was unrealistic, the day worked out otherwise.
Upon disembarking from Queen of Aran, our ferry out of Doolin, onto the Kilronan quay we walked toward the bicycle rental and Pam refused to bicycle. Her objections were many, safety, impending rain, time. She did have a point about time, the ferry leaves at a set time leaving errant tourists to fend for themselves. We were unused to cycling, still Dun Aonghasa is just over 5 miles from Kilronan, less than an hour round trip. With our starting time of 11:30 am there was 3.5 hours slack for returning to the quay before the 4 pm departure. Plenty of time for wandering the ruins and stopping along the way.
We followed Pam’s advice. Still there were the many bicyclists. Perched on our horse drawn carriage, on the uphill runs, each bicyclist we passed was proof positive to Pam of the wisdom of our choice. I was silently envious of their freedom and overlooked the many mini-buses on the narrow road.
When the day comes to mind, not often, I am left with the guilty feeling of not stopping into the bicycle rental office to cancel the reservation. An email was waiting for me the next day, asking where we were. Thus, the title of this post, “Stiffed.”
Pam’s reasons for not wanting to ride a bicycle around Inishmore:
“I hadn’t been on a bike for approximately 20 years. However, if it wasn’t going to rain (it did), if the narrow road was larger, if there weren’t any minibuses loaded to the gills or horse traps sharing the same single lane, I would have considered it. Sitting back and enjoying the beautiful view on our private horse trap and listening to our very knowledgeable tour guide/driver was the highlight of this adventure for me. I am sorry you felt like you didn’t have a choice.”
Pam’s correction of my statement about her being concerned about time:
“Time wasn’t a factor in my decision making. I also didn’t have a problem with you biking but there was no way I was going to do that.”
Michael Stephen Wills Photography 