Journey Across Ireland

Every now and then I like to take a little bre a few extra socks and a couple o and take off for some distant pl.

Well, this is one of those breaks righ and I'm delighted to have you wi.

Welcome to Windows to the Wild.

I'm Willem Lange.

Last evening, I boarded the plan Airport near Boston with a bunch of fellow merry tra.

And we flew 7 hours through the to Shannon, Ireland.

And we met the dawn as we landed the next nine days.

We're going to take you around this beautiful country.

We'll visit medieval castles.

Well, maybe see a puffin or two on the west coast of Ireland.

And we got a little surprise for near the end of the trip.

Now, to help us navigate this beautiful country and deepe our understanding of Gaelic cult we're lucky enough to have with an Irish guide an all Irish guide 100% 102%.

Gerry Ronayne.

Gerry, it is a pleasure to work.

It really is great.

And travel with you to see you get to see a great we or we're going to have a beauty.

Now, you've been at this for a w I've been at this now for about I've been at this for 32 years.

Why two years?

And you know more about Ireland than anybody else in the world.

I know enough about Ireland to get away with being a semi ex.

Okay, That involves a certain am blarney A little bit of oil grea the wheel.

Well, it's a pleasure so far.

Well, we got a few more days com.

We do.

And we'll have, I hope, a wonder.

And where are we at the moment, Well, we're in a place called Bo where before there was the bon ratti.

This land was the site of a Viki trading camp.

That was around 970 AD.

Since then, it's been home or less to the upper crust.

The first fortress was built in 1250 of Earth and wood.

Stone replaced those defenses.

And over time four castles were.

Three fell during battles.

The Irish took back the Fourth Castle by force.

And that's where we are today.

A bin ratti is known for its bea.

Park, where they have reconstructed ol from the 1800s, and it's magnificent castle.

The castle is from the 1400s.

That's one of the finest medieva in Europe.

It's massive in terms of size and really interesting because it has a wonderful colle of medieval furniture and you can freely visit the cas.

You can wander through to differ you can get great views from the.

You can visit the family apartme.

You can see how the soldiers liv.

You can see how visitors were tr when they came to the castle.

So it's a wonderful castle with.

We're on the south coast of Ding and the Dingle Peninsula is behind me.

The surf.

You see this coming all the way from America.

That's the mother Atlantic Ocean.

A little while we'll be up to the end of the pe and we'll take a ride out to the islands if the weather's halfway.

There's a lovely narrow road looping around the Dingle Penins.

It runs for about 30 miles.

If you drive it, you'll pass a lot of history.

We're looking at the blasket isl.

That's great landscape and the b.

And little white spots where the cottages used to be go.

Well, that's what's left of the the roofs are blown in.

And all the people are gone now since 1955.

A long time ago, the great blasket island sits off the coast of the Dingle Peninsula.

It's about four miles long and a half mile wide.

The only full time residents on balsket Islands are seabirds and.

But there was a time when royalt as it were, lived here.

They had a hereditary king until 1955.

On that island.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

They referred to one of the orga of the King and the king's son, you know, But they're all gone n this is the Dawn Queen Cemetery, so don't count Cemetery as the cemetery for the blasket.

And the blasket islands are out here.

And magnificent and rocky shapes.

But they were inhabited up until the 1950s.

The problem with the blasted isl is that there is no great depth.

So to bury people, they would br across in open boats.

The two or three miles across here to the pier at dawn, kind of a winding serpentine roa that goes down there.

And then they would the cortege along here and off to this area.

So this is where the people of t blasket islands are buried.

Well, this morning, we're in the heart of a Killarney and we're about to cli into a series of wagonettes their called Horse Drawn.

And we'll take a ride in the Killarney National Park.

If the horses get us there and I'm looking forward to it, going to be a beautiful day.

My name is Paul and the horse's name is Ginger, but I named her after my mother in law, Sir.

They're very similar eyes.

Our pilot for the day is Paul Ta.

He's a guide with a sense of hum and a great patter and all guys we are entering the national par where there's no motor traffic a.

Just for the horses, People walking or cycling.

That's the landing gear.

There's three wheels on our wago and we're still rolling along.

But so this area is known as monks wood, but the nuns wouldn't.

They didn't want to get out of t go away.

How many years you've been at th I'm doing nearly 40 years.

38 ye.

Wow.

Love the job hate the work.

You think you might make a caree I'll try, sir.

Killarney National Park spreads out over 26,000 acres are mountains, forests and lakes all within its boundar.

To get around the park.

You hike, bike or catch a ride with someone lik.

How many horses you've been thro.

Oh, no, not too many, sir.

So you could work with a horse f 16 years, you know?

I mean, true.

If you.

It's so tough to let the.

It is.

It is.

Because you get very attached to you know, when you're working wi all the time.

They're a buddy.

Yeah.

You know, And they look after yo.

You look after them.

Like when I go home, I kiss my horse and pat my wife.

But you don't have a wife, I wou.

Yes, you do.

She's a long suffering woman.

But the three rings of marriage, the engagement ring, the wedding and the suffering.

Out here to our right.

This is Killarney's largest lake.

Oh, it's just.

It's.

This lake is known as Lane, which means Lake of Learning.

We also call it the Lower Lakes.

You've got three lakes, the lowe the middle and the upper, and al lakes meet at the point called the meetings of the water you've got the highest mountains in Ireland.

They're in the background, guys.

These are the McGillicuddy rings.

McGillicuddy actually quite a popular family name of t. Reeks means Misty or Smokey.

And if we're all familiar with t McGillicuddy Lucille Ball, then.

And there's 3414 feet and two an inches in height.

Within the park, There are mansions and beautiful.

After Paul entertains us on our into the park, he drops us off at McGrath's ho...

This is one of the nicest places in Ireland here, and it's partly because it's so beautiful that t this as the site of the house.

Used to be an old hunting lodge.

And then in the 1850s, Queen Victoria, who had been to Ireland, only on decided that she wanted to come and see some of the beauties of.

So she decided to come here to K and Lord Killarney, who had his castle on the far si.

He wanted to host her, but the guy who owned this place as well, Cardinal Herbert, he wanted to host her as well.

Big thrill you know, for these f to host the royal family, you know, a real big deal to get close to the top of the p. So he decided to extend his hunt.

And this is the house that he bu.

And then you have the gardens.

So if you want to if you like ga and if you want a beautiful trea then just here to the left of th you have a little walkway down to the gardens.

There's not so much formal garde.

It's more Parkland garden, but a beautiful Parkland garden.

But anyway, just brought you up this little pathway here, becaus we're at the same latitude now as Newfoundland.

So I remember when I was a child growing up and you would read, you know, you see the Tarzan com and so on in the jungle, and you'd see plants like this thing behind us here.

And you would think the jungle, But like, here we are, and it's growing perfectly happily here, you know.

So it's a tree fern and isn't it.

But they come from, as far as I know, New Zealand an.

Good morning.

We're about to leave Killarney n and move north toward Galway and the Cliffs of.

It looks like another beautiful day here in Ireland.

I don't even know if they have any blue birds but you know what.

It's going to be a beautiful day.

So stick with us.

The Cliffs of Moher run along the Atlantic Ocean for eig.

There's something inspiring abou.

Their calls out to artists, musi and, of course, geologists.

Well, we're at sea again.

We're on the west coast of Ireland, just off the cliffs of Moher, Mo which is probably the most popular tourist attraction in we or west of Ireland.

The cliffs right behind me, the rise above 700 feet out of t just beautiful, spectacular clif of sandstone and slate and shale.

And about 330 million years old, different from the Carboniferous.

And the cliffs are pockmarked with colonies of seabirds, all kinds of crazy bird puffins and kittiwakes and shearwaters.

Everything beautiful, whether it was in the day or not, I don' The sun isn't quite on the cliff we won't get a good really look.

But they're.

They're fantastic cliffs, don't.

We couldn't get close enough to photograph t but this view is not too shabby.

We arrived back at the dock and to town, and the Doolin music ho Christy Barry and his partner Sheila have spent a lifetime playing music and telling storie.

Doolin House is a great place to relax and experience Irish hospitality.

We leave town and head north along the coast to Galway.

It's a harbor city that's mainly pedestrian, so we'll be on foot most of the.

Good morning, everybody, and wel to the City of the Tribes of Gal.

It is my privilege to guide you this medieval city today.

And we're going to start off at the Spanish arch and then go and up Kevin's lane.

And then the Saint Nicholas.

Church, which is the oldest chur in Ireland in continuous service since 1320, built as a Catholic.

Then, when Cromwell served came it became a Protestant church.

Ten years later, it's reverted back to the Cathol.

Then in 1691, a year after the Battle of the Divine.

Charity, our Red.

King Billy Spies came here and it became a Protestant church again.

So you're right in the center of.

And behind me, this building here at Lynch's ca which is now a bank, is the best preserved building we have in Ga.

It was built by the Lynches at the same time as the church.

And if you look at the architect of this building and Saint Nicholas Church, they're very similar in building.

It would have taken in McCambridge as well.

And if you take the plaster off the just it finds this limestone I see you find the limestone eve because the layers of Galway cit is the exact same today as it was in the 15th 1600s.

Well, now, Liam, you almost walked the old man's.

And what age are you?

87.

So we're nearly the same age.

Yeah, we are not.

You were only 22 when Kennedy ca I was teaching school, so that w. Just what a great walk.

And I learned so much.

But your'e a great walker.

Nearly as good as I am.

Well, I'm.

I'm.

I'm enjoying it, but, you know, you'll never lose it b.

In my day.

Oh, we never lose it.

I guess every day it's something.

Yeah, Yeah.

If you're in Ireland, you can't help but listen to the music everywhere.

That's what we did in the seacoast town of Roundsto.

Within the walls of an old Franciscan monastery.

It's a shop.

That's where you'll find Malachy.

Good morning, everybody.

Welcome.

Welcome.

Thank you.

Maliki is my name.

Malachy Kearn.

But nobody in Ireland calls me that.

It's Maliki.

Boren.

Maliki is a master craftsman, a.

He makes and plays a drum of goatskin stretched acr a wooden frame.

A skilled player strikes the skin in a variety of producing subtle and exciting so.

Most loved Irish.

The bow on this drum is very old, but in Ireland it also represents freedom.

Our victory for us.

England.

When England ruled Ireland.

You know, if you were singing an Irish song, your rent was dou to was all farmers everywhere.

Interweaving of family didn't just family of two sizes.

There's 14, 16 and 18 inch bodhr and the size the dimensions aren't so critica.

It's about the skin and the play.

So the making process is a like we have here.

This is goatskin, and it's fabulous to work with as the best skin for drum making, I believe.

Pivot it falls out of my hand.

Falls out of mine too.

Now you can do rim shots.

Yeah, very posh.

And you don't use the other end.

(Singing) Very well done.

Thank you.

It's a beautiful early afternoon in Connemara.

It's rocky and barren and craggy.

And we see a lot of sheep.

And that's about it.

At the beginning of the story.

I promised you a treat as a dog.

I look forward to this.

Stop.

Yeah.

It's a family run farm where Joe Joyce trains border co.

They charge up and down hillside as steep as any in New Hampshire White Mountains.

Come, come.

So the reason we have the dogs, obviously, is to collect our she.

I have 200 sheep scattered out on that mountain o.

They go from this ridge to that ridge there.

Cody, thank you.

When I have 200 sheep on the mou that's five farmers of sheep mixed in together for the border with over a thousand sheep on th across the lake walks, shouting, And yet the most difficult thing to teach these dogs to do apart from showing up, is to take the sheep away from m now, good girl.

That must be 45 degree back yard I think it's even steeper.

I was told they.

So when I went building this hou they told me I was a bit crazy.

Well, you are.

That's the gradie you had.

What I was thinking.

I was looking at what I'd be loo when I'd have the house put in h. Yeah, I want the dogs when we ar the dogs like the dog is working.

So really, when I start with the young dogs I always look at a dog that's mo biddable to me and more friendly.

And I'm always looking at the na and the temperament because it's very important that the dog is happy working.

We say goodbye to the Joyce fami and their dogs and say hello to a historic Iris distillery.

Killbegan began distilling whisk and ran into some bumps along th.

And after 201 years of operation the wheels that powered this place went idle.

In the early 1980s, the town fol raised enough money to open it as a working museum.

Shortly after it reopened as a b.

Behind me is the old mill wheel that powered this 19th century d. Beautiful system of Brooks and locks and w. Here is it's fantastic.

I'm looking for a heroin to tie and spin around for an old fashioned movie.

But now we're about to sample a of the Killbegan whiskey in the old 19th century distille.

I can't wait.

That's Irish.

We depart till beginning for our final destination, Dublin.

If you've never experienced a musical pub crawl.

You will now.

(Singing) (Singing) Oh great!

There's a building on O'Connell where an important chapter of Irish history was la...

The General Post Office Building an immersive look back at the 1916 Easter Ris.

It was an armed insurrection against British rule.

The uprising lasted six days.

Nearly 500 people died.

The 1916 rising was a rebellion against B rule in Ireland on the 24th of A.

On Easter Monday, a collective of rebels, people who wanted to fight against Brit rule took over various buildings Dublin City, and they made this their headquarters.

The proclamation of the Irish Re is one of the most important doc in Ireland, if not the most impo.

It was written and signed by seven gentlemen who became leaders of the 1916 u.

Five of these seven men were sit in the GPO during the rebellion.

The proclamation states that the Irish people would no longer acknowledge Brit and that Ireland's men and women had declared a republic.

We end our story at the Glasnevi prior to its consecration in 183 Irish Catholics had no cemetery in which to lay their dead.

So we're 190 years old this year.

It was established by the man buried beneath that round tower.

A man by the name of Daniel O'Co.

Now he established Glasnevin Cem as a place to bury people from all walks of life.

It's a non-denominational cemete.

So we had people from all religi and of non.

Well, we're saying goodbye here.

Our last day here in Dublin at the Glasnevin Cemetery, which I guess is appropriate for a good place to end.

And we've had a wonderful time, and I'm glad you came along with.

I'm Willem Lange and I hope to see you again on Windows to the Wild.

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