Downpatrick - Day 2

---

Geo: 54.3288, -5.71664

Did I mention that Downpatrick is the place that St Patrick is (allegedly) buried. You would never know it walking around the town, St Patricks Cathedral, Patrick street, Patricks square, Patricks lane, oh, and the name of the town is DownPATRICK! They really really like him here. Truthfully, I wanted to come to Down because this is where Uncle Miler was a bishop, of the Catholic variety. I thought he would have spent time at the cathedral here, but as I have now found out he was the Bishop of Down and Connor, so he may not have been here. As I walked through St PATRICKS cathedral today, there was no mention of the man. Although the cathedral was built in the late 18th/early 19th century, which is about 200 years after his time. And he wasn't a very good catholic so they may not like to talk about it. It is on the site of an old monastery, but I think that may have been a ruin in Uncle Milers time. It was extended and refurbished in the 18/19th century.

After the cathedral I made my way down to the Patrick centre. This museum had a lot of interactive displays on the life of St Patrick. It was actually quite interesting. However at the end I was left wondering how much of what we know about the actual man and how much is myth. Early historical accounts of the man where written five hundred years after his death by monks commissioned to document his life. Their viewpoint might have been a little slanted ....embellished ....OK they were massively exaggerated. There is a letter, called the "confession of St Patrick." Which is written by the man himself in order that his family and colleagues might better understand his motives. His motives may have been honourable (at least to him) but I had to wonder, this is the man who drove the Druids out of Ireland. I don't know a lot about the druids but I do know that they were a group not to be messed with in their day. So how much firepower did St Patty actual have? Meh, I'll still have a drink for him on March 17 anyway.

When I walked out of the Patrick centre I was greeted with a freezing cold wind. I had some lunch and walked back to my hotel to collect my car. On the way I was greeted with hail. The Irish winter has settled in and now I'm really looking forward to spain.

I got the car and drove out to the stone circle at Ballynoe. There is very little fanfare about this circle. Even though it is a national monument, it's on farmland. There is no carpark to speak of, just a sort of laneway that could fit one or two cars but no more. Clearly the good folks of Down are not keen to glorify their pagan ancestors. From the laneway I walked down a long pathway which had stone walls on either side and tree/viney things growing out of them. The tree/viney things form a sort of arch over the pathway, very creepy. Oh and there were thorns to snag my clothes as well, you cant have a creepy pathway without thorns. At least it offered some shelter from the wind and rain. Finally I came to the end of the pathway to a paddock with the stone circle.

The circle surrounds a big mound which covers a cairn. Its like a mini Stonehenge. The rocks don't tower over you like the henge, but there are a lot of them and I could walk around them unfettered. There are two upright stones outside the circle and like other stone circles they align with the sun at a specific time of year. However the other stone circles I've seen align with the sun at the winter solstice, Ballynoe lines up during the spring equinox. I wish I could tell you I felt that eerie sense of place I get when I've walked into one of these ancient sacred sites. Unfortunately what I felt was cold. Maybe its not on a leyline, or maybe it was just really cold.

After the stone circle I made my way back I to town and decided to check out "The Mound of Down." Guess what...its a really big mound. It is a circular earth wall with a big ditch around it. The experts don't actually know what it is for, it may have been an old fort at some point. The wall itself appears 30 foot high so its definitely not a naturally occurring phenomena. The wall itself is now overgrown with trees, but the ground around it cleanly mowed. The gates leading to the field it was in were locked shut. I could have climbed them but it was really cold and I wasn't much in the mood to freeze to death going somewhere I clearly was not meant to go. On a clearer day I might have taken a closer look but it was time for a whisky.

---