Another day, another mountain

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After yesterday's very challenging Croagh Patrick climb, Emily took Matteo, Adrianna and I on a less-strenuous trek up a smaller mountain with a path to a shrine to St. Patrick overlooking a hidden mountain-top lake at Maum. The wind was ferocious and it was very cold - it was so wild and completely apart from the world. Ringed by mountains with a green valley below us, it was breathtaking - or maybe that was the wind. We sat for a while on some rocks by the lake and just listened to the water lapping at the shore before heading down the mountain path. Emily trekked back to the van to come around the mountain to meet us. As we came into the valley, the rain came down in sheets - we watched it move across the valley towards us, so we huddled under some laurel trees that were growing out of the rock and ate the sandwiches we'd packed that morning - good Irish brown bread with cheese and ham and fruit and choco cookies after that. The hike took us down through the valley and past lovely farmland. We saw some hares, plenty of sheep, of course - they're dumb as dirt but fun - and a trio of friendly donkeys. I opted to explore the village of Roundstone - they filmed The MatchMaker here, Janeane Garafolo's post- Romy and Michele attempt to let Hollywood mould her into a romcom star in the late 90s. I like her far better as an acerbic beeyatch. But that's me. When the rain started up again, I found the Shamrock pub, a peat fire and a Guinness to ward off the chill. Back in lovely Letterfrack, our last night here - Matteo cooked a truly delicious pasta dinner - simple and really good. We had some wine, talked about our travels - Matteo has done a desert trek that sounds amazing and Adrianna chatted about maybe one day leaving the kids with Matteo and heading to Venice with me. She knows where all the off-price designer outlets are. But for now I am happy to be in green and lovely Ireland, ready to snuggle under the thick duvet for the night. Tomorrow, we take the 1 p.m. ferry to the Aran islands, a very isolated spot. There may be no chance to blog there, but I'll catch up with you Monday from Dublin if that's the case.
Slainte,
Linda

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Photos

mountain-top lake
What a view - a statue of St. Patrick overlooking a small lake at the top of the mountain we had just climbed

This is how you herd sheep
A car kind of makes the dogs redundant, but everybody is staying in line anyway

burro on the street interview
So do you read The Star?

in Roundstone
This local fella said he was dressed like this to remind people July 4 was coming. He was what we call an interesting sort

dinner is served
It was SO good!

the secret..
is to leave the peeled garlic whole - it was amazing. Hey, they're Italians, they know from pasta.

Emily takes a wee dram
Irish coffee. Mmm.