After the great success from the bus tour on day one we decided to do it again for day two this time northward bound. It was become a beautiful day and already the sun was poking through the morning clouds. I have to say, Wow Connemara is amazing. It reminded me of traveling out west near the Tetons or elsewhere in Wyoming, except he ground here keeps all the water unlike the Burren so the rolling plains are still rolling and filled with grass, but below is more like a bog than a desert. The mountains were far more substantial than the mere hills in the Burren, however they were still round, still completely treeless, and still had rock walls on them. But they were covered in far more vegetation. Also the stone in Connemara is granite and in the Burren is limestone. We learned that the locals farm the peat moss and burn it in their fireplaces for heat and cooking. And in fact this is still a practice done today. So we say lots of peat farmers. I guess the best way for me to write this post is to just talk and then at the bottom show pictures with extensive captions.
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| The mountains in Connemara, the "fields" you see below are actually bogs and if you jumped in you could quite easily sink and get stuck |
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| Connemara is dotted with lakes and ponds which adds to the picturesque landscape |
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| This is peat that has been cut and now must dry for almost 2 months. however once it dries it can never absorb water again so it is a great source of fire fuel especially in a wet climate like Ireland. |
The main destination of the day was Kylemore Abbey. It was originally a house a very romantic Irishman built for his wife and it included an extensive Victorian walled garden. However when Mr and Mrs Kylemore passed away the house was claimed by the church and became an abbey and was a girls school until 2009. It was an incredible place and you almost want to say it is perfect...
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| The beautiful Kylemore Abbey, on a lake, in the mountains, in Connemara Park, in Ireland... pretty much perfect |
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| One part of the walled garden, with the gardeners house in the background. There used to be greenhouse but they were in disrepair after being neglected for some time. However there is a new owner of the Abbey who is reinstalling them. |
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| The main entrance to the Abbey |
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| At the Abbey there is also a small Gothic church, however interestingly it only has one nave so it is not in the shape of a cross like most Gothic and other churches. |
After Kylemore the day was not over. We still went to Killary Fjord (the only Fjord in Ireland) and the Inagh Valley. These places were even more incredible. Connemara is owned by the government but the land is called commonland. Which means that the land is owned by no one but everyone can use it. And there were literally sheep everywhere grazing up in the mountains free to roam where ever they wanted. They were just marked with colored paint on their wool and ID tags. We also met a friendly pony...
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| Killary Fjord, The things in the water a for farming mussels |
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| Killary Fjord, approaching the town of Killary. This area of Ireland was one of the hardest hit by the potato famine and a mini Irish trail of tears incident happened here walking along this Fjord |
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| The Inagh Valley, if you look closely you can see the sheep dotting all the mountains etc |
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| Inagh Valley from the valley floor |
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| Or friend who lives in Inagh Valley and is very fond of apples... |
Our last destination was the ruins of a old friary. It was really cool to see this building and imagine what it looked like when it was lived in.
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| The remains of the friary |
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| Inside the main hall where the monks studied |
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| Stairway to nowhere? |
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| One of the naves of the church part of the friary where commoners came on sunday etc |
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| Hello Friend, sorry they sheep proofed the friary entrance... |
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