Today we had a nice morning, ate some porridge, and drove to Ballyvaughan! We walked the scenic loop behind the school, past some of my favorite stone pavement, and then up the main road back to the college. My roommate, Jen, and I used to walk that path home from school whenever we weren't in a rush and wanted some extra special views. It looked quite different (simultaneously more overgrown and less green), but it gave me another rush of memories and nostalgia.
When we arrived at the Burren College of Art, we first stopped by the office and said hi to Karen (who still remembered me!) and found Mary, the president of the college. She was so sweet and classy as ever. She invited us to lunch at the cafe. I said hi to Anne and Martina, the kind and goofy women who made my lunch every day in college. They were exactly as I remembered and even teased me for ordering my usual tuna bagel with sweetcorn. I was afraid I'd react (tuna's supposed to be pretty bad), but instead I felt nothing! We talked and ate for an hour or so and watched as a wedding took place in the same field where I spent many days relaxing with friends in the shadow of the Burren mountains. At one point Robert Wainwright, the groundskeeper and driver who I'd spent a fair amount of time with, stopped by. He immediately remembered me, made some of his classic awkward jokes, and asked me questions about things he clearly remembered from our conversations. He then guilt-tripped me for not befriending him on facebook yet. It was awesome to see him!
I then took Dan to see the inside of the Newtown Castle tower (oh yeah, my school was in the grounds of a 16th century castle), which was set up for the wedding! Apparently, no matter the forecast, you don't plan for outdoor weddings in Ireland. So, although the wedding was being held outside, they had set up the inside of the castle just in case. It was really neat to picture what a wedding would be like inside this castle that I had spent so much time in! At the top of the tower, we looked down and watched the wedding, listening to the beautiful harp and vocal musicians.
Next we hiked behind the school. There was some cool art in the woods from BCA students. The mountain can be tricky -- there aren't really any paths, so you just have to aim in a direction and find the best footing you can see. We found our way up very well, and eventually came to the first cairn, which then led us to each cairn until we reached the top. I had one tricky incident in which my foot went through what I thought was grass, but turned out to be a deep crevice in the stone pavement -- whoops! Otherwise, it was pretty incident-free!
One of my reasons for wanting to do this hike was nostalgia, but the other was that I'd heard the Burren is gorgeous in bloom, and I'd never seen it in the summer. I'd read about a unique ecosystem with tundra plants on the top of the stone and Mediterranean flowers and ferns within the crevices, but all we found was a drought. There were no orchids, no blue gentians... just some dried out (or "burnt" as the locals described it) grasses and ferns with a few rugged flowers here and there. Even the stone pavement looked strange -- I'd always seen it wet, looking glassy, almost metallic or like a mirror. But dry, it just looked like dusty rock.
By the time we reached the top, I started feeling woozy. It was a very hot and sunny day, yet again, and given the lack of water in Ballyvaughan, I was a bit dehydrated. But the views at the top were amazing and nostalgic, and the breeze felt amazing
The way down was a bit rougher. We tried to take a shortcut and ended up trudging through intense, thick pricker bushes and blackthorn trees -- not fun! As the leader, I emerged completely covered in scrapes, which for me, turns into welts. We were exhausted by that point, and decided to take advantage of Ireland's open fields rule -- you can walk through anyone's fields, as long as you close the gate after you (or leave it open if it was open). It's understood that if you injure yourself, or harm the livestock, that's on you. As long as there's a sign posted about where the bulls are, it's not the farmer's fault if you get mauled. (At least, that's how I remember it from Gordon D'Arcy's class six years ago.)
Anyway, we cut through a field of cows and I remembered how much I loved walking through cow pastures!! They get so curious and all stare at you without knowing whether to come closer or not! It was so freeing, and Dan teased me as I frolicked and skipped through cow plops and grass! We went through the gate and then continued on the road to get to an old abandoned house where I'd spent a fair amount of time getting inspired and taking part in a photo shoot as Alice in Wonderland (CW: self-harming). Once again, I had the eerie feeling that it was exactly the same, while also being totally different; the trees and walls and ruins were just as I remembered, but it was too dry. There was no wild garlic, no moss covering the trees and stones, no rain or damp smell, and the ivy/grass there wasn't a deep enough shade of green. It was still such a peaceful, magical place. It's in the ivy- and moss-covered woods that you can feel why Co. Clare was the birthplace of so many fairy stories and myths.
Finally we went into town, bought a bottle of water and a pint of B&J's cookie dough ice cream at the Spar, and ate the ice cream in the shade of a tree by the water.
After leaving Ballyvaughan, we drove to the Poulnabrone dolmen, a ~6,000 year old portal tomb. The drive itself was beautiful, but the Poulnabrone was less magical in the dry heat (again, the stone looks glassy and eerie in the rain), and was surrounded by tourists. We then tried to stop by Caherconnel, but it was closed for the night, and we decided not to bother seeing the fairy ring or Cahermore. Instead, we headed to the Burren Perfumary, which Mary had recommended highly for its walking trails and garden. It was lovely! The tea room was closed, unfortunately, but we loved the educational herb garden. It had sections labeled "kitchen," "tea," etc, and had descriptions of each plant, medicinal uses, scents/taste, history, and other properties. The store had soaps, tea, candles, perfumes, moisturizer... many made from just flowers found in the Burren! There was also a video with cool info about the Burren's wildlife.
On our way home to Ballinderren, we explored Kinvarra for dinner and watched the sun starting to think about setting over a beautiful harbor and pier. I got a hamburger for the first time in years(!!!) with mash and salad, and Dan got a seafood platter.