The Ham Nomads

10 Jun 2014. <IE> Letterfrack, & Connemarra, Co. Galway; Turlough, Co. Mayo —

View from Diamond Hill in Connemara National Park

Warren on Diamond Hill

Connemara National Park. Woke up refreshed — cars starting to arrive full of keen bushwalkers. We decided to do the Lower Diamond Hill Walk - only 3km, but that's not at all horizontal. The keen walkers add onto this the Upper Diamond Hill Walk, which is only another 3.7km, but up over the closest peak (445m high). Susie and I piked at this, but the walk we did do gave us great exercise and some of the most spectacular views you could imagine. We are so glad that the girl in the Cardiff Tourist Information Centre recommended Connemara to us! The rains actually held off, at least until just before we got back in! Coffee and scones in the Tea House — after all, we did have to keep in out of the rain! Then we decided to move on!

Kylemore Abbey

The next item on our tour agenda was Kylemore Abbey and Garden. You now how Warren hates crowds of tourists — well this place was a tourist magnet, with at least 20 tour buses in the car park when we got there. But the place is so magic that even Warren's jaw dropped. The first glimpse of the Castle/Abbey was enough to take your breath away. It was built as a castle by Mitchell Henry in 1867. He was quite an innovator and, in 1893 set up a hydro-electric generator to power the castle from streams that constantly run down the mountain behind it.

Gothic Church

When Margaret Henry died in 1874, her husband had a Gothic Church built on the grounds as a memorial. She herself is buried on the property a little further round the lough. The Estate changed hands a couple of times, and finally was taken over in 1920 by a group of Irish Benedictine Nuns, whose convent in Ypres, Flanders, had been destroyed during the First World War. (They were formed when women of Irish aristocracy fled to Europe while the penal laws were in place in the 17th and 18th centuries, when it was not the best thing to be a Catholic in Ireland under the Protestant British!)

So we toured the Abbey, and its associated Formal Walled Garden — one of the most spectacular and magic gardens we've ever seen. The garden has been replicated in the last 20 years, after an extensive archaeological investigation to ensure that it is authentic to its 1901 original in every way. It only uses plants introduced to Ireland prior to 1901.

Part of Walled Garden

We adjourned to the associated restaurant, for a treat of Apple and wild berry crumble smothered in custard, and the inevitable coffees. We did mention that, with the amount of rhubarb we saw in the kitchen garden, we were surprised that apple and rhubarb crumble (or pie) wasn't on the menu!

From there, we drove another spectacular drive around more lakes (loughs) and mountains, until we arrived at Turlough (just past Castlebar - Caislean an Barraigh), were we have sussed out the National Museum of Country Life, and also a Round Tower, for tomorrow's activities. We are now parked at Park (an Pháirc), a couple of kilometres away.

Distance driven — today, 52 miles ( 83 km ); to date, 2,291 miles ( 3,687 km )