Spent a very enjoyable weekend at The Burren Law School 2004 whose theme was "The Environment and The Law". There were a number of interesting half hour lectures and three field walks out on the hillsides with Brendan Dumford who has produced a booklet on The Burren and told us there is an amount of information on the website www.burrenbeo.com. The lovely wildflowers depend on the farmers grazing the higher ground during the winter which clears the grass and allows the flowers to grow just now when the cattle come back down to the lowland.
We visited the ruins of the Church of Colman and Brendan did not think he had been in Clonmacnois. This trip was named The Slieve Corron Nature Reserve.
Another field trip they took us to the Burren National Park where there seemed to be something interesting at every step. Wind breaking walls in a T shape to give shelter to cattle, passage graves, hazel trees a foot high and about twenty foot long growing between the rocks so as to avoid the wind. The highlight was a stone fort on top of a steep high ground that would remind you of Dun Aengus ? on Inishmore.
The best trip probably was on Saturday morning at 7.30am for Michael Greene's Mornig Walk led by local historian Jim Hyland. Meet in the square in Ballyvaughan at 7.30. Doc and Nora and me fein took up the offer and were there at 7.20 to find three girls waiting. Parked the car and Doc ran back to find a group of men had now arrived. Told them she was going back to the car to collect two others and when we got back they were gone.We had no program and found out they had visited Ballyalban Forts and Mass Rock. Dick, Betty and Molly the dog made the wise decision and stayed in bed. Reminded us of the late Sally Kennedy (see Tue Apr 27)
By coincidence I arrived back in Shannonbridge yesterday afternoon and soon afterwards Sally's husband Joe dropped in for a visit. Joe is in good form and among the news I was interested to hear that Father Tommy Daly's brother from Rashina is in the retirement home in Clara.