Why You Should Never Drive in Rural Ireland After Dark (plus religious dilemmas and a beautiful island)

Well, I've fallen behind again.  We had two late, late nights and by the time I could write, my get up and go had got up and went (a hank of fur, a hunk of cheese, anyone?)  I'll still write separate posts for separate days.

    So, back a few days we were debating whether to stick with our original plan to travel down the west coast, ending in the busy southwest, or avoid it and stay longer in the north.  We loved Sligo so much we decided to stay another night and then spend our last night in County Mayo.  It meant missing nearly every well known part of Ireland, but we kept hearing how tourist clogged that whole area was.  So we made our decision, and I don't yet regret it.

    There were so many aspects of Sligo we still wanted to see- ancient sites, the places referenced by Yeats, areas associated with Irish myths...But we still didn't have enough time. So we finally settled on trying to find Tobernalt Holy Well.  

     The Tobernalt Well is now a pilgrimage site for Catholics, being closely associated with St. Patrick. But before St. Patrick used the well, it was a holy site for those practicing the older, earth centered faith. In particular, the festival of Lughnasa, which honors the sun god Lugh, was held at the well.  That practice is not entirely lost- the traditional day of Catholic pilgrimage is intentionally the same weekend the Lughnasa festival would have been held in ancient times.  (And I've seen a number of flyers, actually, for Lughnasa festivals in various places we've been- it's this weekend).  

    But while I could find information about the well, no where could I find directions to the well.  The best I could come up with was that it was by a pier on Lough Gill.  So we dutifully hopped in the car and began driving around the Lough.  After all, if it was a pilgrimage site, wouldn't there be signs?

Not so much.

At least, not where we were driving.

      We cruised along, Michael trying not to drive the car into the water and me peering up every dirt road we passed.  At one point, seeing a crumbling wall and gate, Michael pulled over and I climbed out to see if that could be the spot.  I went into a small courtyard, through the rock wall (if you look really hard, you can see the hole I climbed though), and out the other side.  By the water there was a building almost completely destroyed, with a huge tree growing through the wall.  And it should have been beautiful, but it was CREEPY.

Now it's true I've been reading a collection of old Irish fairy tales in which the fairies are almost always malicious, or at least devious.  And it's also true that the longer I'm here the more vivid my imagination becomes. But I swear, it just felt wrong there.  I practically ran out. 

    Finally, we gave up and asked directions.  Several times.  But we did finally find it, and it was marked near the well itself.  And it was very.....Catholic.  it had an altar, numerous stations for prayer, a sound system tucked in the trees, candles for burning, small altars with various white statues tucked into every nook...

    And I was, truth be told, completely put off at first.  It felt like it had been the Catholic version of Disney-ified.  Any inherent sacredness or power seemed to have been utterly subsumed by the inordinate amount of stuff that had been placed there.
    Now to be clear, I take no issue with Catholic worship in general.  Despite being a UU minister, I actually love the high ritual of Catholic worship.  But this well had been holy for thousands of years. Did people really need so much guidance to step into that holiness?  

   But what was really bothering me, of course, was the act itself of taking an old sacred site and covering it so thoroughly with Christianity that the rest was essentially lost.  It felt like a very concrete manifestation of the ways in which (some, some, some, not all, or even most!!) Christians judge so arrogantly and fiercely anything non-Christian, or not Christian enough, while utterly disregarding the ways in which Christianity is indebted to older religions for not only its practice but its sacred stories and beliefs.  (Garrison Keillor's ridiculous diatribe about UU's and Christmas comes to mind.)

   Which, needless to say, is not fair of me.  The well site was much simpler until it was largely destroyed in a storm.  It was somewhat recently redone with great care by people doing their best to honor the sacredness of that place as they saw it.  And it does have power for some.  We saw a number of people come and silently pray at those altars that I found distracting.  And tied to one of the trees were various offerings, each of which held their own prayers and stories, some of them likely heartbreaking.

    Eventually, as we sat in the quiet of that place (there are multiple signs asking for silence) I found myself revising my own inner narrative about St. Patrick and his conversion of Ireland from pagan to Christian.  I have always seen it as a story of religious violence, not physical but spiritual: ripping people from the earth honoring tradition of their roots and pushing them into the physically violent Christianity of the Middle Ages.  But we've been here long enough for me to understand that life was already physically violent- wholesale slaughter, rape, and slavery was the norm.  And the message of love, dare I say catholic love (small "c" intended),  offered by St. Patrick, himself a former slave, is the same revolutionary message I try to offer today in my own work.
    I am still pretty ignorant about St. Patrick's history.  But the visit to the well has ensured I will take the time to learn more.

    You may think I'll wrap up after that long, long ramble.  But no!  There's more.
We left the well and headed to Achill Island, pronounced Ah-kill, in County Mayo.  Achill Island not only had blue flag beaches, but numerous stone circles and dolmens, along with the highest sea cliffs in Europe, which we hoped would make up for missing the cliffs of Moher.  It was also a Gaeltacht region, meaning Gaelic was the primary language spoken, so we hoped it would be somewhat traditional culturally.

    All of the above was true.  It is absolutely gorgeous, filled with old sites, and an artist's enclave.  But there was a reason we were the only American tourists to be seen.  Oh my lord did it take us forever to get there.  The drive was beautiful- like stepping back into Donegal.  But by the time we got to the Island, we didn't have time to do much of anything.  Kai and Tess were burnt out on driving, and we had a two hour drive to the B&B ahead of us. So I kept them on the beach (such a hardship) while Michael went up to the cliffs- he had given me some good time to myself and it was time to repay the favor!
    It was cold on the beach, and if you look closely in the photos, you'll see there isn't a single person in the water not in a wet suit.  Everyone has them here, including kids, because the water is frigid.  But oh so, so beautiful!!  Despite the drive, if you are ever in Ireland, Achill Island is worth a visit.  Just leave yourself some time.
    Speaking of drives, we still had a long one ahead.  Which brings us to the last story of the night.  We left the Island around 8pm, planning to stop in Westport for some dinner before heading to our B&B in Cleggan, near Connemara National Park. Which meant we would get to Cleggan around 11pm.  After dark.  Gulp.
    The B&B was on a peninsula, in another one of those places to which  googlemaps and mapquest can't quite give you directions.  We made it to the turn off to Cleggan just fine.  But there were three different roads, and we had no idea which to take.  Because this has been a long post, and I'm tired, suffice it to say we drove for an hour up and down that bloody peninsula.  And I can now assure you that very narrow roads, crowded with purple loosestrife and meadowsweet, running along loughs on one side and dead ending into the sea, with no street lights anywhere and multiple unmarked turn-offs, are surely beautiful in the daylight.  But on the night in question, there is a small possibility that around midnight, as we were still driving up and down the roads with absolutely no idea where we were and two small girls in the back of the car wondering when they could go to bed, I asserted that I would like to stab said beautiful roads.  I don't know what that would have accomplished.  But I really, really meant it.
    Thank God Michael is an extrovert.  He noticed lights on in a house, and while I insisted they must be asleep, he pulled in.  We could see a whole family mysteriously up.  He knocked on the door, asked for help, and God bless the Irish, the elderly man of the house got into his car and led us to a turn off we'd missed.  Ten minutes later we were at the Hazelbrook Bed and Breakfast.
Thirty minutes later we were sound asleep.
Can I get a hallelujah?