Irish Tour with Car and Driver/Chauffeur

The river through the gardens at Birr castle with the suspension bridge. (Click on picture to enlarge to see bridge.)

It is not often that i venture into county Offally and that is something i intend to put right. President Obama's visit to Ireland and to his ancestral home of Moneygall has really not only given a boost to Offally but it has also now forced me to include it in my list of "places to visit". This particular part of the country has been very much neglected and when you visit there you will, like me, wonder why. The magnificent bogslands of Ireland are here in all their glory, and what a wonderful sight they are. They stretch for miles and miles all sides. This is really the heart of Ireland, the engine room of this country which fueled our nation with the peat that kept our homes warm, and which still supplies much of that fuel for the homes that have not turned over to oil burners. You have the lively towns of Roscrea, Tullamore, Birr and Nenagh, and many more quaint and beautiful rural towns and villages which are all well worth a visit, and Birr castle is a treat. The only failing i found at Birr castle was what i felt was a very definite lack of proper promotion. This place should be buzzing all the time, and if it was mine, i think it would be. Yes....i could even live there.

I promised you more pictures from my present tour ,and today i am including some more from Birr Castle and the rest from the unforgettable Clonmacnoise monastic settlement.
Before i move on to Clonmacnoise i want to emphasise once again just how much i enjoyed Birr castle, and especially my tour with Henry Smith and his buggy service at the castle. We would have been lost without him as there is so much to see here in the gardens, and it is imperative that you have someone with you who can tell you all about the variety of
flowers and plants and trees here and their origin and age, and much more. How the rivers were transformed here and how the lake was developed, and why.The history of the castle, the families who lived here, their wonderful history as inventors, the telescope, and their research in Astronomy, the invention of the electrical turbine which changed our world forever, and so much more.All of this you will miss if you just walk the gardens alone. Henry's tour takes about 40 minutes, and when you finish that, then you can spend all the time you like walking the garden on your own. For the small amount he charges it would be very foolish to miss this guided tour.




Another view of the magnificent gardens at Birr castle.
One of the Round Towers at Clonmacnoise with the Shannon River in the background.
Another view of the second Round Tower with one of the magnificent Celtic Crosses in the foreground. This cross is a replica of the real one which is now housed indoors at this centre to protect it from erosion.
Again this is a replica cross. You can see the real one which is kept inside the centre. Here you also see the Cathedral in the background in which Rory O' Connor , the High King of Ireland, is buried. Now here you see the real cross in its new home inside the centre.
This was another of the wonderful crosses which they believe was hit by lightning and sadly decapitated. They never found the top portion.
The tiny church of St Ciaran who founded this monastic settlement in the sixth century. St Ciaran claimed that anyone buried here would go straight to heaven. There should be more places like that.