My second day in
Ireland was even more eventful than the first, and it started off with the
snooze button. I woke up late and rushed to get ready and check out of the
hostel. I hurriedly bought a brownie at the little café in Galway's main bus
station (because of course they had
gluten free brownies), though the day ended up being so busy that it wasn't
eaten until the next day.
The first stop was
Cong village, a tinier-than-tiny village in Ireland's Mayo county. Never heard
of Cong? Perhaps calling it by its other name will ring a few bells. Cong is
also referred to as the Quiet Man village, because it is where the 1950s movie of
the same name was filmed, and I'm pretty sure the locals will not let you leave
Cong without knowing this fact. There's even an official "Quiet Man Fan
Club" with their own building and everything. The Quiet Man may be the
reason most people visit Cong, but it's actually probably the least interesting
thing about this village.
On one side of Cong
lie the ruins of an abbey that dates back to the 12th century. The dirt ground
that covers the surrounding cemetery is the same as the dirt ground covering
what was once the inside of the cathedral, where monks studied and prayed some
centuries before.
Only upon walking
through the abbey and exiting out the other side will you come to a series of
small streams. I crossed the bridges over these streams and found a small stone
house in ruins and lacking a roof (much like the abbey itself), built on the water.
A small hole was carved into the center of the house's foundation, exposing the
river flowing beneath it. The structure I was standing in was the monks fishing
house, where the abbey monks once fished for their food under the shelter
provided by the house walls (and, at one time, its roof).
The next stop after
Cong was the Burren. Burren sounds like the word 'barren,' and at first glance,
it seems like an appropriate name for the place. The region is dominated by
rocks and crags, giving it a grey, lifeless appearance. But the small patches of
grass you see here and there are analogous to the tip of an iceberg. In
reality, the majority of the flora and fauna of this region exist and flourish
several meters below the surface, in between the massive cracks in the rock.
Indeed, the Burren contains 75% of all floral species found in Ireland and it
is an ecological hotspot for much of the country's wildlife. It is also where
the Poulnabrone dolmen can be found. Dolmens are ancient burial sites, marked
by gigantic flat stones arranged to create a sort of archway over the grave
entrances. The bigger the dolmen, the more important the people buried within
them were, and the Poulnabrone dolmen is massive. Dolmen are sometimes also
called portal tombs, because some civilizations believed them to be doorways,
portals to the next world, the afterlife. And I have to say, though I'm not
religious and not superstitious, there is something otherworldly about being in
the midst of Poulnabrone, which has stood in the Burren for the last 6000
years.
The last major stop
of the day was the Cliffs of Moher. The tour guide gave everyone two hours to
spend wandering the cliffs and initially I thought that sounded like plenty of
time. But by the time my two hours were up, I realized I could have spent the
whole day there. The cliffs are world-famous and, being there, it was easy to
see why. The view from them is absolutely breath-taking. I could write a
thousand words about the beauty of the cliffs, but in truth, they're
indescribable. Anyone wanting to know will just have to see it for themselves
someday.
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