Aran Islands, Ireland
This morning we anchored off the Aran Islands, three limestone rocks in the middle of Galway Bay where for centuries people have scraped out a living from the bare ground. By bringing seaweed and a little dust blown into crevices in the rocks up onto the limestone surface, they have, over the centuries, managed to create a few centimeters of soil. From this thin layer they grow a few potatoes. Together with the fish from the sea, also dearly bought in the stormy North Atlantic, they survived, preserving their language, Gaelic, or Irish, and their culture. This is one of a few places in Ireland, called the Gaeltachs, where the language is still spoken by most people, and it is to Aran that schoolchildren come every summer from all over Ireland to learn the language of their ancestors and the official language of the Irish republic.
After getting to know a few of the very friendly folk of today’s Aran, we walked up a hill over the limestone to Dun Aengus, a hill fort on the southern coast of the island. Protected on the sea side by a 100 meter vertical cliff, dropping straight into the raging sea below, the early inhabitants built this fort perhaps 3000 years ago, to protect themselves from invaders from across Galway Bay. They had a clear view of the Bay, Connemara to the north and County Claire to the east. The construction of the fort is on a truly grand scale with a series of alls and chevaux-de-frise outside the main wall. It must have taken decades to build and today it stands as a most fitting monument to the strength and ingenuity of these early people. Here in Aran, and in all the places we are visiting in the far west of Ireland, the remote and wild part of the country we are brought in touch not only with the wonderful people who live here today, but the generations of magnificent people who have gone before.
This morning we anchored off the Aran Islands, three limestone rocks in the middle of Galway Bay where for centuries people have scraped out a living from the bare ground. By bringing seaweed and a little dust blown into crevices in the rocks up onto the limestone surface, they have, over the centuries, managed to create a few centimeters of soil. From this thin layer they grow a few potatoes. Together with the fish from the sea, also dearly bought in the stormy North Atlantic, they survived, preserving their language, Gaelic, or Irish, and their culture. This is one of a few places in Ireland, called the Gaeltachs, where the language is still spoken by most people, and it is to Aran that schoolchildren come every summer from all over Ireland to learn the language of their ancestors and the official language of the Irish republic.
After getting to know a few of the very friendly folk of today’s Aran, we walked up a hill over the limestone to Dun Aengus, a hill fort on the southern coast of the island. Protected on the sea side by a 100 meter vertical cliff, dropping straight into the raging sea below, the early inhabitants built this fort perhaps 3000 years ago, to protect themselves from invaders from across Galway Bay. They had a clear view of the Bay, Connemara to the north and County Claire to the east. The construction of the fort is on a truly grand scale with a series of alls and chevaux-de-frise outside the main wall. It must have taken decades to build and today it stands as a most fitting monument to the strength and ingenuity of these early people. Here in Aran, and in all the places we are visiting in the far west of Ireland, the remote and wild part of the country we are brought in touch not only with the wonderful people who live here today, but the generations of magnificent people who have gone before.
