The Aran Islands

On the weekend we finally went to see the Aran Islands, well the main one anyway.

The Arans are 3 islands just off the coast of Galway. They are the most western point in Europe - next stop New York! People have lived on these islands for thousands of years - which is amazing considering how isolated and harsh they are. However this isolation has made a trip to the islands something special. People say that it's like going back in time, and to an extant they are right.

The main island, Inishmore, is the largest of the three and is about 12km by 2km in size. It has a population of around 800 people, most of whom descend from generation after generation of islanders dating way back. Gaelic is still spoken as a first language by the locals, one of the few remaining pockets of Ireland that do so.


We had heard that the islands are very rocky, desolate and harsh - and boy were they right - rocks rocks rocks rocks. Practically the whole island has stone fences creating small paddocks, which in the 'old' days kept cows, sheep and pigs or were used for growing grains and vegies.
These days however it seems that tourism is the main source of income. The line of mini-vans waiting for us when we got off the ferry raised our eyebrows - however I guess it makes sense.


As the island isn't that big you can walk around, however it would still be quite a walk, so we decided to hire pushbikes instead (if you were going just for a daytrip I guess a minivan tour would be more practical). Somehow we managed to get lucky with the weather and we had a perfect day for riding bikes right across the island.
The Arans have a number of world-famous forts - huge ring-shaped stone walls used for defensive and possibly ceremonial purposes. Our bike ride took us to see a number of them as well as some old churches, whose walls are still standing after all these centuries.

The most famous fort is Dun Angus - situated on the edge of huge cliffs at the top of a hill. It would have given perfect views of any raiders coming up the hill, and along with the defensive walls and 'minefield' (fields of rocks placed vertically in the ground to slow down any horses and people charging the fort) would have been pretty effective - i guess. The views from inside the fort, looking out over the cliffs and out towards the USA somewhere in the distance was brilliant on such a sunny day (winter is really starting to set in here now in Galway, so we were quite lucky).


We saw a number of other forts on the island, and also rode (we're so unfit) up to the highest point on the island, and climbed an old lighthouse there to get awesome views of practically the whole island. Check out my panoramic view from the lighthouse in the picture above (although i think this website shrinks the photo quite a lot). It shows one of the ringforts, the main town and the distance in the mainland. You can also see the myriad fields with their stone fences, and the locals' houses dotted along the few roads.

Unfortunately the main tourist season has now finished and there is only one restaurant and bar open in town at night, so after a quite nice seafood meal and a few beers in the pub we had an early night.

The next day the weather had turned a bit and the morning gave us a few showers, however we had by now seen the more distant sights, so we could walk to the remaining highlights closer to town. These included what is perhaps the world's smallest church, perched high on yet another rocky peak, looking down at the Atlantic ocean on one side, and the tiny airport and second harbour on the other.


Not far from there we set out for another ringfort. There wasn't much in the way of signage and it pretty much involved just walking across field after field of rock (with the odd cow there eating what little grass was growing on top) until we eventually got to the Black Fort. Like Dun Angus this one uses the towering clifftops as a natural defense, and is set out on an outcrop, with a huge stone fort wall blocking it off from the rest of the island. This one is more low key than Dun Angus, but for us it was much more impressive - so isolated, no-one else around, brilliant cliff scenery - it really gave you a sense of how life in ancient island would have been (apart of course from us still having phone coverage, digital cameras, and a cooked meal on the way home!)

By the way - I had a beautiful lunch on the way home - a new-looking pub that had really bad service - however I had a Warm Scallop Salad with Balsamic Sauce. I'm not seafood expert, but this was a damn good dish, and even Ally was impressed with how it looked - i really shoulda taken a photo of it...

So we pretty much saw the sights of Inishmore (minus a few that we somehow missed on our bike trip) and got a good taste of life how it used to be. We'll try and get to the other 2 islands on a daytrip soon.

Next week - we're off to County Clare to check out the famed Cliffs of Moher and the Burren and whatever else we can find on the way.

Cheers.