Day 9 - Aran Islands and the North Atlantic

Welcome back all to the Day 9 (Sunday) recap.  Day 9 Pics & Videos here: Day 9 - Aran Islands

So we got up early (relatively speaking) had our usual great breakfast here at Rathbaun hotel in beautiful downtown Lisdoonvarna. Then got on our way to Doolin pier (just miles away) for the ferry ride out to the island Inishmore. 

Quick geography / history lesson.

The Aran Islands are 3 islands off the west cost of Ireland in front of Galway bay.

From Doolin it is about 7 miles out to the closest one (Inisheer) and 14 miles out to harbor on the east end of the farthest one - Inishmore - that we visited.

According to our guide, Thomas, Inishmore has 750 to 800 fulltime residents, Inishmaan 2-300 and Inisheer 200.  

Reading all the info at the points of interest, and from what our guide told us, the islands have been inhabited since about 1100 BC.  As a result of various people coming in and conquering the ones already there, there is a plethora of different histories on the island.  The ancient Celts, the Romans, the Normans, the English.

As I said yesterday, the seas off the coast here have been very angry the last few days.  The sightseeing ferry tours to the bottom of the Cliffs of Moher (pronounced "More"" were cancelled for several days and only got started back up this afternoon.

They did get the ferry to Inishmore back running yesterday.  Thought we did see some pretty sick people get off while we were in Doolin for the Folk Festival.  It was pretty rough water yesterday.  Calmed down slightly today.  But still had 8-10 seas.  So the ferry was rocking and rolling until it got in the lee of the first island (Inisheer), then the swells calmed down somewhat.  The winds and waves were coming from the S-SW.  So once we were on the north side of the islands it was fairly protected.

The boat ride out was about 40 minutes. The Ferries are all very new vessels with all modern equipment and very seaworthy.  I found the ride to be very acceptable considering the conditions.  Anita was not uncomfortable at all. 

The ferry could haul 200 people, but there were only about 150 on the ferry we were on going out.  Coming in there were probably closer to 200 as it was the last one of the day back to the mainland.

 We had a very enjoyable tour of the Inishmore in the back of horse and trap (buggy) owned and operated by very nice resident of Inishmore named Thomas Faherty.  His family has been on the Island for as far back as they can trace.  Besides all the usual places we visited, we did get to see where Thomas and his 11 siblings were raised, where they went to school, etc.  Which Anita and I found absolutely charming.  Thomas was a genuinely nice gentleman.

We were joined on the trip by Croi Mor, the horse (Croi Mor means big heart) and Taylor the dog.

The horse and dog are somewhat of celebrities.  They were used (or "seen" as Thomas put it) in a soon to be released movie about the Aran Islands starring Colin Farrell.  Thomas had a big laugh about that.

We had a great time just visiting with Thomas on the 3 hour carriage ride around the Island.  We probably had as much fun talking with Thomas as we did see and visiting the ancient sites of the island.  Not to lesson the impressiveness of the sites, but we've seen a lot ancient ruins in the past 9 days. 

What was more impressive to us was the starkness of the land.  You could count the tree's on the island on one hand.  There were almost none.  A lot of vast, open, wind-swept fields - mostly of rock.  And stone rows everywhere.  There had to be people on this island for 1000's of years to get all the stone rows built.  The stone rows divided ownership.  Then divided the property into small pastures the animals could be moved around in and where small gardens were set out.

The interesting thing about the farms is that there was almost not topsoil on the islands when humans arrived.  So what they did was they moved sand and seaweed into to form topsoil and support gardens and animals.  They still do that today.

It was a very worthwhile trip that we would do again.  The pace of a horse and trap ride was perfect.

On the way back on the Ferry they made the announcement that anyone who wanted to do Cliffs of Moher ferry ride could change boats once we docked and go out.  Apparently, there were a lot people of on that ferry, us included, that had their Cliffs of Moher trip canceled or postponed due the weather.  They warned us it would be "a bit bumpy" since we were going to be out in the open, North Atlantic.

It was rough seas, but not all that bad.  No worse than the first 15 minutes of the ride out to Inishmore.  But there were a few uncomfortable people on board.  The captain did a could job going through the swells and when he turned to bring us back along the cliffs he slowed down and positioned the boat in a way that it took the waves nicely as we worked our way along the cliffs.

The cliffs are impressive from below.  Some are 700 feet high.  And of course there is the cave from Harry Potter Deathly Hallows Part 1 where Harry and Dumbledor have to go into to retrieved a Horcrux.

Also some good views of seabirds.  The largest mainland colony of Puffins is here.  And they were easily identifiable in the water.  There were also Guillemots, Razorbills, Fulmars and Kittiwake.  I can not claim to have identified any other than the Puffin and the Razorbills.  There were a lot of those around.  The deck hands were trying to show us the others, but seeing that it was raining most of the trip, they were hard to see.

On the way back I talked our way onto the bridge of the Ferry boat and spent most of the trip back talking with the Captain.  Which you was my high point of the boat ride.  It was cool.  The Captain was great to talk with.

So we had adventurous day and came home extremely tired from hiking out to couple of the ancient sites.  The two main sites we got out and walked around were the Dun Aonghasa (heres a link if you are interested in more info:  Dun Aoghasa)  and the Seven Churches. (and heres a link if you are interested in more info on this interesting site: Inishmore 7 Churches)

Day 9 Pics & Videos here: Day 9 - Aran Islands

Tomorrow we off to Galway city for 2 nights.  We don't have any concrete plans or reservations.  We make a day trip to go the area where Quiet Man was filmed.  Which we are told is very interesting and also one of the most commercialized tourist area there is.  But heh, you can only look at some castles, ruins and ancient sites - right.

Have a great day. 

Anita and Jim