The bridge over the Shannon River at the appropriately named Shannonbridge!



Charleville Castle near Tullamore

 

Lex at Clonmacnoise - you can see the Shannon River in the background where Viking raiders would have sailed

Pope John Paul II was here



Me against one of the round towers where the monks would hide from the Vikings and other attackers. As you can see, there were lots of tourists there today.

Replica of one of the crosses (the original is housed in one of the round buildings you can see in the background)

Have no idea what this bird is called, but I call them the "Phantom" birds because of their Phantom of the Opera mask!



Another cross replica in front of some of the ruins



Lex outside one of the ruined chapels

 

Ancient gateway at the Kiladerry Cemetery just near Daingean

Grave of Pat Cuskelly who died in 1927 aged 74

This adorable baby robin was in the graveyard

Lex outside the Daingean town hall

Tuesday, 29th July                        TULLAMORE

 
Robyn writes: We've had a lovely day today. We both slept in until about 7.30, then got ourselves organised to get downstairs for breakfast, which was included in our hotel room tarrif. They had a lovely spread of pastries, scones, fruit etc plus the full Irish cooked breakfast. I had a fried egg, sausages and hash browns and Lex had sausages and tomatoes. We were very well set up for the day and could hardly move by the time we'd finished!

We set out about 9.30 - first, we were looking for a new phone charger as for some reason, our other one wasn't working, and we will need the phone to use as a satnav. We had no luck in the shops in the town centre, but found another little shopping centre on the way out where we finally got one for 15 Euros (horribly overpriced but better than the 30 Euro one Lex saw yesterday.) And at least this one works!

We then headed out towards Daingean, the home town of the Cuskelly family. One the way, we called in on the little village of Killeigh, where we'd stayed in 2006 on our last trip here - all still looked the same. Then we drove on to Daingean, which was about 15 degrees warmer than our last visit, but sadly just as overcast. We explored the remains of the old Protestant church graveyard (last time we were ankle deep in the swamp that it was at the time!) but still failed to find any Cuskelly graves which are apparently there. It's all come back to me just how deteriorated gravestones get in Ireland - you are lucky to find any name you recognise. Then we went for a drive around the town and went back to the very old cemetery on the outskirts of town. Last time we were there I hadn't even gone in, as it was nearly dark and rainy and so cold that the girls and I huddled in the car! This time I did get to look around at least and we saw the one Cuskelly grave there - that of Pat, who would have been alive when 'our' Cuskelly family left Ireland. The graveyard has a fascinating gateway, with wonderful old carvings on it. Lex and Glen photographed it last time but we were able to see it much better today.

We went into the town office and asked about local records. The nice man there asked our name and Lex said "Cuskelly". He said, "Oh, Kelly - that's quite a common name..." and I said,
"It's actually CUSkelly," - and all of the office chorused,
"Oh, Cusklee!" (Phonetic reproduction with emphasis on first syllable). Apparently the way we say it in Australia is not the authorised Irish version....anyway, he said there are still some in town. He suggested that we call on Father Townsend, the local priest, to check for records first, so we headed up to the Parish house but unfortunately no-one was home. Hopefully we might get back there tomorrow.

From Daingean, we headed for Clonmacnoise, as it was now after noon and it's about an hour's drive away. We enjoyed the drive through the Irish countryside and found Clonmacnoise easily. One thing we've noticed since 2006 is that now things are actually quite well signposted - last time you were lucky to find one! The entrance fee was 6 Euros each but as we are English Heritage members, we get in for free. Yay! As soon as we got there we had lunch in the cafe (vegetable soup and brown soda bread - has an interesting texture and an unusual taste) then set off to look around. Lex knew quite a bit about it already as he and Glen had visited it before, but I'd never seen it.
The monastary there was founded by St Ciaran in 546, and over the centuries grew to be very large, rich and impressive. Unfortunately in the four centuries from about 800 to 1200AD it was attacked and trashed about 40 times by the Vikings, the Saxons and the locals! I imagine this all got a bit disheartening, but every time they rebuilt, and developed strategies like building the tall, round towers where they could climb up by a ladder, pull the ladder up, and stay safe inside. The Shannon River lies right next to the site so it was easy prey for the Vikings especially. Today, however, there was nothing more threatening than a few pleasure boats on it, but I imagine a thousand years ago the site of a Viking longboat rounding the corner would have made your heart stop beating. There site remained a monastary right up until the time of Henry VIII, when of course it was finally trashed for once and for all - all of the buildings lost their roofs and anything of value was stripped away. It certainly stayed holy ground to the locals, though, with burials there right up until the end of last century, even though the new cemetery is right next door. There were three huge Celtic crosses there which have now been moved indoors and replicas put where they were. Also a new chapel where Pope John Paul II prayed when he visited Ireland. There were an amazing number of German tourists there - I think we were about the only ones speaking English at one stage! On the way out, we drove around to the Nun's church, which had the most amazing carvings on its doorways, mostly still in quite good condition. It would have been a lovely building.

We then headed towards Shannonbridge and then back to Tullamore, taking a different route to see some of the other little villages along the way. We drove into Charleville Castle, which is on the outskirts of Tullamore, to have a look at it. This is a fairly amazing building, built in 1798 but once the Troubles started, it was uninhabited from about 1912 and was nearly a ruin before volunteers started repairing it. It looks pretty good now and is obviously being used as a venue for special occasions, as they were setting up something quite big when we were there. Mind you, it is apparently one of the most haunted places in Ireland, so I wasn't too sad not to get inside...it was nice to see it, anyway, and it's NOTHING like Charleville in Queensland!

Once we got back to the hotel, we had a rest for a while reading our current books, then Lex went for a bit of a walk around the neighbourhood, before going down for tea. We checked out several of the pubs/restaurants in the area before coming right back where we started from - the pub here at the Bridge House Hotel! Have had a lovely meal there and are now groaning slightly due to overeating while we contemplate repacking and moving on to Cashel tomorrow...