A slogan on the cover of a magazine titles: "Going to Ireland is like living a different life". Lotte and I, together with two friends, went looking for the essence behind this description. We flew to Dublin and moved on directly into the Wicklow Mountains with a rented car. Wicklow, derived from the Danish Vikingalo(Viking fields), seems to be the garden of Ireland. It's very easy to find accommodation because there are plenty of "B&B" (bed & breakfast) signs near the roads. At home, we've made reservations for the first night by telephone at Cregg House so we started searching for this place. After a while we found it on Glencree Road near to Enniskerry. Some of the B&B's are ensuited which means you can have a sleeping room with bathroom and you're able to use their living room. We even had a kitchen and a garden with a beautiful view. There are enormous possibilities for walking in Ireland, with its beautiful countryside still largely unspoilt by industrial development and pollution. The variety of weather produces the light and shade, changing colours, clear light and sparkle which are the attraction of this Irish Wicklow hills and mountains. The temperature climate is ideal for walking (?). We spend two days in these region and we had beautiful weather with lots of sun and warmth but also grey clouds with wind and a few showers. Every hour, the weather can be different! The contrasting scenery and the massive granite outcrops, eroded over the centuries - beside the Military Road from Glencree, over Sally Gap, to Glendalough - are wild and beautiful. The English forged this route into the Dublin hinterland to pursue rebels from the 1798 rebellion, who had taken refuge in the Wicklow mountains. The 50 miles of road led across the rugged hills are a good route by which to explore the Wicklow Mountains. We stopped in Irish highest village, Roundwood, for our first typical Irish beer...

Although I'm not Guinness fan, I've tried several Irish beers like for example Kilkenny Beer (amber coloured), Irish stout (more alike Guinness), Harp (Irish Pilsen beer) and Bréo (white beer from Guinness). Later on, when we moved from the Wicklow Mountains to Lahinch, in the Burren region near the West coast, we discovered a little Irish whiskey bar, "Óloclainn" (don't know if I spelt it right), in the village town Ballyvaughan near Black Head. It was a very small, dark pub with a great deal of whiskeys - I guess I've never seen so much whiskey before - and a series of superb square B&W photographs on the walls. The photos were taken by an American teacher in photography lessons who had made portraits of the village people and held an exhibition in the pub once. The owner of the pub began to like the pictures during the time of the exhibition and he decided to buy them all. But back to the whiskey; 'cause we didn't know where to start we asked the public house keeper which whiskey he could recommend. A few minutes later we were hooked on Irish Redbreast 12 years old!

The Cliffs of Moher, which plunge 700 feet to the sea and extend for five miles, were breathtaking but the weather conditions were very bad at the time we were there. We were lucky to have seen the cliffs after all. After an half hour walk over the cliff path we were soaking wet and everything surrounding us had become grey. We had to return in a thick dense fog. It didn't stop raining that day. We had delicious smoked salmon in Lisdoonvarna that evening. The next day, we went for an exploration on foot up and over the unique limestone pavements of the Burren. We had unrivalled views over a wide area of the Burren's limestone escarpment. The landscape left by the Ice Age has been further weathered by rain and storm. Yes indeed, we had to deal with lots of wind and every half hour a squall of rain. After a 13km walk we were blown out completely.

Finally we moved on to Ireland's city of vibes, Galway, with its unique Gaelic culture and language. Galway is the breeding ground for the traditional music and the streets throb with life. It has great pubs, wonderful restaurants (Mc. Swiggan's) and a youthful, energetic atmosphere.
We explored parts of the wild wonder of its hinterland, the barren wastes of Connemara. It's an area of mountains, loughs, health and bog. Sun, rain and wind bring charming moods (?), patterns and colors. Connemara is the biggest of the Gaeltacht areas. It remains the wildest, most secretive and the most romantic place in Ireland. Nothing much apart from grass and moss grows in this undulating wilderness of bog and limestone. It was the inaccessibility and harshness of the landscape that saved it from domination by the English and their culture. In fact, there's never been much in the area to attract invaders of any kind, and while lusher, gentler parts of the country were plundered by Vikings and Normans, the Connemara clans were left pretty much to their own devices, with the result that this remote corner of Galway has remained a stronghold of Gaelic language and culture of this day.
We went from Salthill along the coast towards Casla for a walk near the Glenicmurrin Lough. Rather more than three hours walking through this wasteland with a very stiff breeze (6 to 7 Beaufort!) was certainly enough to experience the inhospitality and roughness of this area. We now know that Ireland is like its weather! The last day we drove around Lough Corrib, visiting Conga, Oughterard and Moycullen, often described as the gateways to Connemara. We flew back home from Shannon but it would have been more comfortable if we had caught an airplane in Galway.

This is a non-profit web page. All the establishments mentioned in this travelogue are places I've been to and which I would like to recommend to people who like to travel around in Ireland.

Thanks to Lotte, Sofie and Maarten. This travelogue is written by / the photographs are taken by Joël Neelen © July 1999. All Rights Reserved.