cece and gus go to ireland: Mountains, Sheep, and Tiny Towns

September 13-14, Leenane. We hiked in the Connemara National Park yesterday. From the highest point we reached on Diamond "Hill," we could see the real hikers, dots moving across the summit well beyond our possibility. Younger, we would have said, Let's scamper up there." But our view was great enough.

Today we walked the Famine Road, a public works project undertaken during the great famine. It runs along the south shoulder of Killary Harbour starting at the Killary Sheep Farm. We are trying to do a serious walk each day.

We have complained a lot about the weather, so let it be said that today was a sunny day. Of course it rained off and on, but basically it was a beautiful sunny day. That noted, we will report what the owner of the Killary Sheep Farm ( pronounced like Hillary to our surprise) said to us: "It has rained more this year than at any time in living memory. Last year was bad too. Too much water, not enough sun." The silver lining? Lots of rainbows.

He also told us the sheep farm business was having a hard time. The new generation is heading away, and the rich farmers in the east get all the subsidies. That, and the truly fine sheep dog herding performance, reminded us of home.

These past two days have been spent in the mountains of north Connemara. It is the area where the Maumturks, the Twelve Bens, the Mweelrea, Devil's Mother, and Ben Gorm all bump shoulders, and it is splendidly beautiful, well beyond anything we anticipated.

Leenane is at the head of Killary Harbour, Ireland's only fjord, though whether it is actually a glacier-formed fjord is disputed. We are staying at the Convent in Leenane, and the stained glass windows of Jesus, the Virgin Mother, and others are convincing. Sean, the innkeeper, has a son who runs the top local restaurant, the Blackberry. A diner said to Sean's son this evening that he'd heard there were 250 residents in Leenane to which Sean's son replied, "They must be counting those in the graveyards too."

We glimpsed in the news that the Brexit vote was stirring Irish nationalism in the north. We will have to ask our friend Bruce Nelson about that.