Achill Island

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Our trip to Ireland was timed for a wedding to two friends of Fran's, however two days before the wedding date it was canceled. We took the non-bride to her home on Achill Island and took a day to explore this beautiful place. It rained the whole way there, however we had good conversation as we made our way up the coast. Even though Fran's friend was devastated, she was still wonderful to get to know and learn about all of her great community activism. We stayed with her at her parents home for the night and went hiking at Achill Head the following morning. This was when I hit my limit of rain and mud. The hike was twice as long due to the road being closed for flooding and when we got to the top, all we saw was fog. The weather had beaten me and it wouldn't have surprised me if Fran had pushed me off the cliffs, as I was in a fowl mood. After sitting in the mud with the sheep for awhile, I decided to try again and the fog lifted just long enough to get glimpses of the cliffs which are highest in Europe. Once we got to the bottom of mountain, the rain stopped, the fog lifted and the sun came out for one of the first times in our trip.

The remainder of the day was sunny and we had time to walk along the coastline, eat outside at a cafe, visit a grave yard that showed the tragedy of the potato famine and Burrishoole Abbey near Newport on our way back to Galway. The conflict between England and Ireland has such deep oppressive roots toward Ireland, that I will not even try to explain. However, it was interesting to learn that during the potato famine, Ireland continued to export food to England, even though the people were starving. This was due to many of the land owners being British and it was their rent and the overall laissez - faire policy of Britain. What gets done in the name of economics, at times or often has horrific effects.

When the sun came out, it was amazing. Everything was green, blue and whitish rocks.

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