Sleat Peninsula, Isle of Skye

Another perfect evening: “tha an h-oichdhe àlainn a rithist”. The sun has gone behind the Blue Rampart of the Cuillins, "An Mur Gorm". I don’t think there is anywhere quite as beautiful as this. Soon I’ll be leaving this place of perfection, of jagged ramparts and flat, murmuring seas, of midges and cold winds.

Am Mur Gorm (The Blue Rampart) - Sorley Maclean

A huge amount of Gaelic has already taken root in me and is probing and pushing and searching for places to take up residence.

A-nis, tha i glè fhlìuch. Tha mi ann an car, agus tha mi ag eisdeachd cèol bho Rèidio Dhà. Tha mi a' smaoineachadh mu an Eilean Canaidh agus an ròn no an boireannach, gun robh a' seinn cho shnòg, cho bhreagh. Bean-sìthe?

The other day at lunch I asked Ruaraidh and Uilliam what the Gaelic word for "comedy" was. After much deliberation they couldn't think of one. I asked what the word for "tragedy" was and Uilli laughed, "there are very many of those!".

Sea of Erin

Sea divides us,

    Sea of Eirinn.

To me, you walk already

    in Tìr nan Òg,

        island in the Western Sea,

            Land of the ever-living ones.

You too now eternal,

your everlasting presence singing

    a sad, low song of the Gael

forever in my heart.

Beannachd leat, bràthmair.

Isle of Canna

 I haven’t really seen anyone since getting off the ferry at 8:20. Another perfect day – Rùm volcanic-looking across the water – further south and bluer than the sea and the hills of Ardnamurchan and beyond, lies Mull; further west flat on the water are Coll and Tiree … even further round, the start of an t-Eilean Ard, the Long Island. I’ve just noticed that the sky has quickly filled with cirrus clouds, streaking from far south over to the north. Rùm has its own cumulus weather system! Sound of seals from small island at the foot of these sea-cliffs. Thought I heard a woman’s voice singing softly earlier – as if she were singing under her breath whilst working. This place is so empty and yet so haunted, like all the Highlands and Islands. Perhaps it was the voice of a selkie, calling me.

Onboard ferry bound for Isle of Canna

It was a perfectly clear night last night – I stuck my head out of the tent and watched the dancing of the Northern Lights: green again, in the northern sky, low over Sleat, dancing up in long sheets to the great plough above.

Onboard ferry from North Uist back to Oban

Last night there was a walking group from Lewis at the hostel – 2 of whom (at least) were native Gaelic speakers. So, I spoke my first words of the language to an older lady: Co às a tha sibh fhèin? and Tha i brèagha an-diugh. I mentioned that I was heading for Sabhal Mòr Ostaig to learn Gaelic and that it was the Carmina Gadelica that had influenced me most in deciding to do this. She described them as "Catholic prayers" which is almost certainly correct – the Free Kirk would have done its best to stamp out any such superstitions. What a pernicious philosophy dissenting Protestantism can be at times!

Youth Hostel, South Uist

Another perfect day comes to an end. I sat on the bench out the front of the kitchen this morning and chatted with all and sundry as the sun shone on us from on high. Went for a walk with Jane from Pembrokeshire and we had a lovely day together in a perfect place. Walked around the top of the island and down the west coast then cut back through to the east. The magnificent drive down here took less than an hour.

Looking at the sunset, sipping my tea, I could see Tìr nan Òg in the wine-red clouds and along the horizon. Yes, I looked and saw hills and passes and valleys and the shore of the everliving ones. I saw it with my own eyes.

Youth Hostel, Isle of Berneray

Another perfect day – light breeze, warm sun, clarity. Quietness – only the sound of a pipe gurgling out its contents onto the kelp-covered rocks below. Soft voices in conversation. A tabby cat stalking the waving grass.

Youth Hostel, Isle of Berneray

OK, this is it – I’ve officially found paradise, on the east coast of Berneray at the Youth Hostel. Views over transparent bay waters to the stony hills of Harris. White sand, emerald green grass and … the ever-present midges!

Lochnamaddy, North Uist

The Uists are simply amazing, I’m almost too scared to step out of the car, the landscape is so utterly empty. No trees, scattered houses, blustering wind.

Northern Beach, Isle of Barra

Incredibly beautiful – white sand is being blown under the tip of my pen, small white breakers underlining emphatically the green, green ocean. Squeals of children playing in the shallows of the frigid water. The temperature is about the same as Stewart Island back on the 1st of March this year: icy but bearable. There are ridges in the sand in the shallows. Nothing on the horizon – out there is the coast of Labrador or further south, where I stood at Cabot’s Landing, Cape Breton Island and looked east to here, where we all came from.

Off Vatersay to the south, an emigrant ship went down in the 19th century with the loss of 333 lives. Was that any worse, for those who stayed, than the parting already endured?

Castlebay, Isle of Barra

There is a funeral on at present here so the cycle hire man is not in his big brown shed. Two ladies walking up the path were speaking Gaelic on their way to the church. I understood “tha mi gu math”. Thought of saying “tha I brèagha an-diugh”: very appropriate on this beautiful day – it must be mid-20s °C. The accent of the Gaels is not usually Scottish when speaking English – it is very soft, so soft as to be indistinguishable from the Gaels of the west coast of Ireland.

I love this place (the sun is shining!). “Quiet found no more within” rules here. You can make as much noise as you like, it will be swallowed, annihilated by this place. I think the whole adult population of the island is in the church at the moment! The pipes have begun – singing a son or daughter home on his or her last journey. Clear and proud in the August sunlight – sailing the final time to the place of the ever-living, Tìr nan Òg.

Death is something these places have plenty of, the old ones taking the old ways with them. It is the stories of the Sons of the Gael that survive here – of Fionn mac Caoul, Cuchulainn and the Tuatha de Danaan: the Norse came and ruled and faded again, leaving only a few placenames. So too is the future for the Sasannach perhaps.

North Beach, Iona

To Iona

Overwhelmingly sad, sitting in Abbey Church earlier, looking at the ferns growing high up between the stones. No light propitious, none at all, ever. I am left to soldier on and do the best I can as a poor, lost child in a hard, cold world. It seems that God does not intervene as we would have him do. This is my fifth and perhaps final visit to Iona. Why should I return? I have moved on and am grateful to this beautiful place: her steady spirit would smile approvingly to see that I have outgrown her. Every place of peace and beauty in the whole world is becoming sacred to me.

I read this morning that the Celtic tonsure, different from that of the Roman Church, was adopted from the druids.

Columba's Song

Chan fhaca mi aingeal
no naomh,
ach chuala mi fuaim na mara
agus eilean mo chridhe
na theis meadhan.


Angel nor saint have I seen,
but I have heard the
roar of the western sea.
And the isle of my heart
is in the midst of it.


Weder Engel noch Heilige
habe ich gesehen,
aber ich habe
das Rauschen des Meeres gehört,
Und die Insel meines Herzen
steht inmitten davon.

Colum Cille (St. Columba), 6th Century

Out there, Dutchman’s Cap, the Treshnish Isles, Staffa.  Old friends, who have guided and sustained me these past five years.  It is no longer raining.  More than eight years ago, I sat here with Anne and looked out to these small, dark islands.  It is unimaginable what has happened since then … and what is yet to come?  The rain is returning.

Oisín's Story - Lady Gregory

A Son of Oisín the Defiant

"Without the shedding of blood,
there is no remission of sin".
But my soul has sweated its blood-tears
and look at the Hades I’m in.
"No one comes to the Father,
except by way of me".
I tried, but you shut the door,
and laughing, swallowed the key.


Long ago I walked
with the fair, tall people.
Now they hide from me in their hollow mounds
of endless dreaming sleep.
I, stranded in eternal wakefulness
as the vomiting machine
eats the last green hill-not-far-away –
leaving this wasteland of the written, unbending word.


Is a word really a word,
cold and silent on a page?
Is knowledge really knowledge
if it doesn’t burn alive in the soul of a man?
Is truth really truth
if it hasn’t grown for 2000 years?


The oak tree on the sleeping mound
is older, much older than that.
And still it grows,
despite the angry axe-blows
of your tribal jealousy.
I sing in her branches,
I rest in her shade,
I drink from her threefold wisdom.


Dana, my mother, is older, much older than you.

West coast of Isle of Mull, Scotland

This is the most beautiful place on earth and at the same time so imbued with sadness. The surge and lilt and fall and rise of the Gaelic on the radio blends with the rushing water’s voice, bathing all in an ancient symphony. The old trees, moss joining them to the older, quieter stones. Silly, friendly sheep chewing and thinking nothing at all. Loch Tuath is still today, sheltered by Ulva’s barrenness. There is another Isle of Ulva, far away … where once not long ago I glimpsed a saddleback, darting stealthily from tree to tree, older than any of us.

Peel, Isle of Man

Driving out of the camping ground this morning, there was the huddled, ruffled form of a raven in the middle of the roadway. I stopped, got out and squatted next to her. Her head was buried under a wing and a fly had landed on her just at the base of her beak. I brushed it away. I picked her up, her head came out and she tried lamely to struggle. I placed her on the grass, under a tree away from the road. She immediately placed her head under her wing again: there seemed to be some injury, some wound there. I squatted next to her for some minutes. She did not move. I straightened up, took a step back and quietly wished her a good death. She was old, she had lived long in these skies of Manannan. It is time for you to go to the place of rest, dear friend.

Raven: Joker-Creator, bringer of news, sacred, revered by Celt, Norse and Native American alike.

And now, sitting here, a hoodie-crow is looking at me: pigeon-style head-bobbing walk, feet deliberately placed. I am so alone here, on this island surrounded by a sea of tears – the tears of the old people, poured into it over centuries of disappointment.

Northwest coast, Isle of Man

Long stony-sandy beach, strong breeze blowing blonded hair in my face, sunlight glaring from water between here and Erin. Faint, distant, blue land to the northwest … Scotland. Otherwise nothing except the radio waves of Ireland, Wales, England, Scotland. For this moment, I am King of Man and the Isles. Strangely, this reminds me of Nantucket, 1000s of miles away. I have seen so much this year and always I return to the sea: the beginning and the end of all things. A lone, droning fishing boat – alone in an empty, shining sea.

There was a Roman fleet stationed in the Irish Sea for centuries. Our modern world order is not yet that permanent. In the Manx Museum in Douglas, the Celts were described in terms of a cultural, technological and linguistic movement or influence rather than a different, invading people. That description was correctly applied to the Vikings! The "Celts" are the same people as the builders of Newgrange, just at a different phase. It is better likened to the coming of Christianity: not new people, just new influences.

No Union Jack flies over this island because it is not part of the United Kingdom.

Chapter IV: Eileanan na Laighe na Grèine (Islands of the Sunset)

Ellan Vannin (Isle of Man)

Alba (Scotland)

Northwest Belfast

This is a fascinating, confronting, depressing city of despair and hope, bigotry and apathy. I missed the ferry last night due to being stuck at the airport for hours after dropping Ian off – there was a bomb-scare which turned out to be a hoax. The night before, we were stopped at an army checkpoint then in town afterwards (just John and I), we saw a body lying covered on the road; there were 2-3 landrovers and some soldiers who had cordoned off the road.

John and his father lived just off the Shankill Road back in the 70s – two huge bombs in that time damaged their home – one 450 pounder just 300 yards away. John’s father rushed home to find the roof, ceiling, windows, door and all the glassware in the house destroyed. My impression: paramilitaries on both sides are seen as one entity and hated.

In the Crown Bar the other night, I wished John Slàinte and he smiled but said quietly that one had to be careful where one used that word.

Cuchulain of Muirthemne - Lady Gregory

Donegal

In the city of Chicago, where the evening shadows fall, there are people dreaming, of the hills of Donegal...

Clouded and green are these hills. The accent here is unmistakably Ulster but we’re still in the Republic. And the not too distant Hebrides beckon.

Renvyle, Connemara

Flowers, dandelions, don’t dance in the wind – they shake like epileptics fitting, catatonic single yellow eyes staring wildly into the sky. The grasses join in maniacally, incessant in their mocking, monstrous caricature of the dandelions’ plight.

In this great turning of cycles, wheels within wheels, the universe’s endless rhythms; I wait for a sign, a word, a whisper … a clue. And receive none. So, the best I can do is continue taking steps along the road in front of me. Why this road? Because it’s the one I’m on.

Doolin

Gods and Fighting Men - Lady Gregory

The gods, the children of Dana, the Tuatha de Danaan, diminish, fade, are defeated by the sons of the Gael and slide gently, imperceptibly into the twilight, the shadows, just out of reach of the probing eye of the mortal. The ever-living ones. Truly a Götterdämmerung – so different to that of the Greeks and Romans.

Skellig Michael

Atop this flat, sloping rock – high above the rippled water, the puffins my only companions, their little bodies and stumpy wings whooshing past on the Atlantic winds. I understand the monks – surely they must have found the most profound beauty, love, understanding, insight … and most of all, longing, in this place. The longing every human has in his or her heart – longing for be-longing. To belong means to be longing. Belonging is found when we recognise and cherish our longing. This is the most beautiful, moving place I have ever been. And the little, cheeky puffins know it! Launch forth, little friends, into the wide blue – glide and sail your ungainly way through this great, beauteous universe of sighs, until you reach that final shore, that final golden shore – Tìr nan Òg! For I too can fly – I too can soar on the lofty breezes, I too can see the wide world beneath me, lying, silent and smiling.

Kenmare, Kerry

The Ring of Beara today was indescribable – we, the children of Dana, inheritors of all this beauty. Reading Lady Gregory’s Irish Mythology last night – Lugh of the Long Hand, “as swift as the naked cold wind of spring” on the horse of Manannan. The parallels with Homer are strong except that the Gaelic stories are somehow less idealised, more human, far more sad, more deeply imbued with the longing living in every rock, stream, river, valley, lake, glade, green, bulging hill and stony mountain in this land of saints and scholars, poets and priests. May the blessings of Dana herself, the radiant light of Lugh, the wisdom of Manannan rest on this fair land and her people. And may their longing never cease! May it rather stir their souls into life welling up in abundance. For there is only one presence in this place, but he has many faces; only one mother, but many are her children.

So many of my roads must be filled with a sadness. But somehow, through this sadness, a sweet beauty shines. The road goes ever on and on …

An Rinn

Yesterday we were in Enniskerry, south of Dublin, in Co. Wicklow and met John and Allan from Belfast – great guys. After an evening and a few pints of the black stuff at the local pub, John and I ended up chatting into the wee hours about the north. He remembers seeing street battles as a 6-7 year old, sitting on the lounge room floor, looking out the window. They used to put wet towels along the bottom of the door to keep the teargas out. We agreed, the north will never become part of the republic except within the context of a greater, federal Europe. He mentioned the influence of the lodges in Ulster – Masonic links everywhere, as I had noticed on many banners in east Ulster towns. If given a signal, members are required to give other members preferential treatment, whether they be policeman, judge, whoever.

Dublin

At Newgrange today and read a bizarre but intriguing booklet about its astronomy and mythology. Lots of links from saints back to gods, even the stories about Paddy seem to be derived from older stories of the sun-god. It is revolutionary to think of stories even of Patrick’s triumph over the old beliefs as having come from older sun-god traditions. This is the ultimate victory of a continuum of belief, expressing itself differently in different ages: historical “fact” becomes unimportant because there is a bigger picture – an underlying, rumbling, primal breath, an undercurrent. Melchizadek as a remnant of an older mythology, still making his way into the pages of the Bible. And Jesus, rising in the east …

There was a burnt-out car wreck in a back street of Downpatrick, about 200 metres from Patrick’s resting place. Orangemen were marching today near the border. And standing inside Newgrange, where the chamber has been so well built that no water has made its way in in 6000 years, 1690 really does seem like just yesterday.

Chapter III: Tuatha de Danaan

Éire (Ireland)

Cumbria

Below my feet, the trout-tickling stones, smoothed by centuries of water, make the Derwent gurgle as it passes. To my left, the bulging Cumbrian hills. All around, a quietness, broken now by a peacock’s strange cry further down the valley. There is utter perfection in this place – spiritually I am home. Trees here are old and slow and permanent. It is only in the presence of the “peopled scene” that I falter. Grey heron, flying silently along the river – disappears from view.

Bangor

The Island - R.S. Thomas

Highlight yesterday was the magnificent castle in Caernarfon. My overwhelming feeling: patriotism is always misguided or hijacked – Henry, Prince of Wales (later Henry V) vs. Owain Glyn Dŵr – did it really matter who won? Almost all of the rulers of European countries were related and utterly self-centred in their ambition. The common people were roped into their silly, pouty conflicts of ego: 9000 of Edward Longshank’s 15000 who took Caernarfon back from Glyn Dŵr were from South Wales. True socialism is the only system that doesn’t pander to this: hurrah for Switzerland 1291!

On Angelsey today – the tomb at Bryn Celli Ddu surprisingly atmospheric inside. Ancient decorated stones, mute, full of power.

Dolgellau

Visited the National Library yesterday in Aberystwyth and was overwhelmed by the monumental scale of Welsh culture – symbolised by the building, dwarfing any other Celtic culture because Welsh identity is so strongly linked to the language. Inside the library, Welsh was spoken, whispered, muttered in every corner. I looked at a facsimile copy of the Black Book of Carmarthen, the original sadly not available due to renovations being done at present. Outside afterwards, in front of the library, an expansive view over the town and the bay. English here is a distant, disdained second – a young, upstart, bastard tongue. My tongue, my culture, the victor’s culture: ignorant in our ascendancy, looking out to sea, unaware of the town at our feet.

The Mabinogion - Lady Charlotte Guest

This morning we walked to the Llynnau Greggennen lakes up the valley at the foot of Cadair Idris. Imposing hills but a fertile, intimate valley, a tumbling burn, gnarled, mossy beech forest, old, quiet stones. We walked with Darren from Manchester and his eight year old son Alex – simple, gentle, a lovely bond between them. The music festival later on in Barmouth turned out, disappointingly, to be a country music festival, complete with stars and stripes and line dancing in the town square. The Youth Hostel is full of thundering children chasing each other on the first floor. I heard them earlier singing Happy Birthday, first in English then in Welsh with great gusto.

Snows of Cadair Idris


Is there snow on the ridge of Cadair Idris?
Yes, there is snow.
Is there wind on the straits of Menai?
Yes, there is wind.
Is there water flowing in the fair valley of Rhaedr Ddu?
Yes, there is water flowing.
Are you all alone in your little stone house?
Yes, all alone.
Does your heart burn for me?


My heart does not burn for you,
for you are gone
and lie now with your glorious, foolish comrades
at the bottom of the Sea of Erin.
My heart is cold, as cold forever,
as the stones that stand
at Bryn Celli Ddu.

This place feels like The Shire, Welsh seems to resemble Elvish and even certain aspects of the mythology are reminiscent: The Welsh “Black Book of Carmarthen” and Tolkien’s “Red Book of Hergest”. But true Celtic mythology is not as clear about good and evil – every figure is Odysseus-like: ambiguous. Polytropos could have been the surname of almost every Celtic figure too – many twists and turns, honesty not usually considered all that important, deceit used as a tool, a weapon. Lord of the Rings appeals because the forces of evil are so much more powerful than those of good – it seems the same when I look at this world: good comes from time to time, unexpectedly, in spite of what everyone does.

St. Justinian

The Coming - R.S. Thomas

Walking the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path – from here, Ramsey Island is just across the water, only some wicked looking currents blocking the way. Little purple clover flowers amongst the many dandelions, gorse ever-present. Stony ground, windswept, green, jagged coast, rocky harbours. Coloured cattle dotted on the hills. Waves, slow, ponderous, inexorable – crashing again, again, again against the rocks between Ramsey and St. David’s Head.

St. David's

Gull

You fly easily across the troubled straits,
light-creature of wing and whiteness.
Soar you do
on the roaring calamities of air,
beyond the point,
away from the mainland;
starlight racing before the grey-black clouds of storm,


across to the untethered island.
Could I, too, heavy-boned and clumsy,
slip my bonds and fly
as free as you?

A picture coming back from Caldey Island into Tenby earlier today on the little open boat – wheeling, white gulls above the multicoloured buildings and the bare stone of the church spire, wheeling against the black-grey and bulging rain clouds … liquid notes into the air – each one a creation, together an expression of something beyond understanding.

The Bright Field - R.S. Thomas

And now I’m alone, behind me Tyddewi – its cathedral and narrow streets. In my face, the west wind, blowing strongly from Erin, bringing dark clouds of foreboding. The wild ponies here amongst the crags, skittish in the math of the storm. This is why I came here. To sit, perfection all around me. And the words of R.S.Thomas clanging like the parish church bells. God is moving again on the face of the waters, out there, beams of understanding, missing me.

Lawrenny, Wales

Welsh is alive and bilingually well – every single road sign is either in English/Welsh or Welsh/English. In Tenby today (the Welsh name is “Dynbich y Pysgod” – the Little Harbour of the Fishes). Standing in the sea was Caldey Island, another of the Holy Isles within this archipelago of Britain and Ireland. It has rained and rained and rained today, washing the stone walls, the narrow laneways, the soft green fields, the gnarled old tree trunks. Washing me … of my sooty sadness … but waterlogging me, weighing me down, soaking me with longing: longing in itself, not for or after anyone or anything.

Song of the West Wind - Bob Reeves

The Holy Isles – is it there that I will quench my thirst? On a windswept, rocky island, steadfast in the ocean – is it there I will learn to love myself enough to never need anyone else?

Chapter II: Cymru am Byth

Cymru (Wales)

Lanhydrock, Cornwall

Sitting in a grassy field near Lanhydrock. Life continues at a great pace but in another location, not here. A ladybug is sitting very still on my page. Green, enclosed fields, forested hillocks, the grass all gone to seed.

I feel deeply at peace, deeply happy and a little bit excited about what life might bring my way in the next year or so. There is nowhere I’d rather be than here, nothing I’d rather be doing. The soft whispering of the spirit in the wind in the treetops and the waving barley.

I feel no deep longing for something other than what I have, just a faint sense of loss, bereavement, of missing someone or something, an awareness of the finiteness of all things, all people, all experiences.

St. Just in Roseland, Cornwall

Visited the church here today and walked 4 miles around Bohortha – a place full of memories for me. I could sense the ghost of my former self hiding in the shadows as I walked, following me shyly, just out of sight. My former presence from 7-8 years ago as real as any departed spirit.

Onboard ferry from Roscoff, Brittany to Plymouth, Cornwall

Konk Leon and the Abers were magnificent – quiet, gentle places, modestly hiding the old times, the ancient, forested days, the saints and hermits and holy wells. And now we are returning to Cornwall after 1500 years away. But even Cornwall was just another stopping point along the interminable journey – man moving ever onwards, unable to stop.

Konk Leon (Le Conquet)

Konk Leon beach.  A magnificent sun, glowering on the low waves, constantly breaking.  Wetsuited swimmers lolling like seals in the warming water.  Green, grassy headlands, rocky shoreline interspersed with idyllic white beaches.  The wind, ever-present, blows in from times past, a Celtic heyday on the watery highways between here and Cornwall, Ireland, Wales.  And the Breton language lives on here, much more present than in other parts of Brittany.

Concarneau, Brittany

Last night in Trinité sur Mer we stumbled upon a music festival.  It was traditional Breton music: big pipes, drums and snake-charming flutes.  One singing group consisted of five men and one woman, all singing in unison, songs undoubtedly of the sea.  The last band on were young, good – the guitar added to the sound.  At the end of the night, a bonfire was lit on the beach – huge flames, a mixture of awe and fear in the air. Looking into the heart of the fire I saw the skeletal black wood silhouetted, animated by the fire in a macabre imitation of a living thing.  People cheered, releasing their fear, their tension.

Chapter I: Highways of the Saints

Breizh (Brittany)

Kernow (Cornwall)

Photo Album

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