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The next morning, after a traditional Irish breakfast served buffet style,
we headed for Kylemore Abbey, a remarkable complex of mostly 19th-century buildings
including a neo-Gothic church, the castle-like Abbey itself, a mausoleum, and
splendid Victorian gardens. Unfortunately we arrived in the midst of a torrential
downpour that didn't let up for a couple of hours, and most of us scurried from
place to place under umbrellas with our cameras under protective plastic covers,
but made up for it by taking scads of pictures of the remarkable abbey and church
interiors. I braved a few outdoor shots, including one of the abbey, with my
Nikon F5 after my umbrella broke, proving, if nothing else, that that camera
can shoot in a driving rainstorm and keep on clicking. It was still raining
hard when we got to a remarkable 19th-century experimental farm now operated
at a reduced scale by an order of nuns---more great old farm machinery and striking
interior views. Overcast light is great for portraits and I shot a few of fellow
trekkers when the rain had abated somewhat, and also an amusing picture of our
sodden crew waiting for the bus to pick us up. Before returning to Galway, we
took some shots en route of the wild and beautiful region, with its mountains,
lakes and panoramic views.
There was supposed to be a walking tour of Galway in the afternoon, and maybe
there was, but my wife and I weren't on it. We sneaked off to do a little shopping
(the aforementioned Irish tweed cap for me, a hand-knit sweater for her), but
mostly to do a little street photography in this bustling, cosmopolitan, and
charmingly Irish city. The locals were almost invariably friendly and gracious
when this fast-talking New Yorker poked a lens in their faces, and some were
even pleased to have their pictures taken. There is no better way to capture
the essence of a place than to shoot pictures of ordinary people going about
their business, and there is hardly a more accommodating or more visually fascinating
place to do it than the city of Galway.
The next morning we were all off on a sleek Island Ferry to Inish Moore, the
largest of the Aran Islands off the west coast of Ireland. Made famous by the
classic 1930 documentary "Man of Aran" the Aran Islands are not quite
as desolate as they were 75 years ago, but they're still fairly sparsely populated
and have lots of rugged seafaring character, not to mention literally thousands
of miles of hand-built stone walls that once served as property and field markers.
Inish Moore is also the home of the Beehive huts, round stone structures dating
from the Early Christian era. After crawling around among these ancient huts
and shooting lots of pictures of them and our fellow trekkers, we moved on the
Seven Churches, an impressive ruin not far from the sea that affords sweeping
vistas of long stone walls leading down to a craggy coastline. Minibuses are
the only way groups get around the narrow roads, and we stopped frequently to
shoot farmhouses, animals, and the sturdy-looking denizens of this anachronistic
paradise, many of whom raise sheep as a sideline. We also ventured to the prehistoric
Fort Duenghus, a brooding ruin on the cliffs, and documented it from every conceivable
angle with our cameras.
For lunch it was back to Kilronan, the one quaint little village on the island,
for lunch and a one-hour shopping break Aran is world-renowned for its sweaters
and other authentic Irish woolen goods. They're hand made of genuine Irish wool
all right (which is one reason there are so many sheep in Ireland!) but what
percentage of Aran sweaters are actually woven in the Aran islands is anybody's
guess. The ferry departed for Rossaveal, where we had parked our bus, at 5PM,
and many of us took great shots of an exuberant group of Irish teenagers who
had a grand old time smooching below deck and mugging for our cameras topside.
On the short ride back to Galway Bay Hotel, seasoned pro and mentor Joe McNally
lambasted us all for shooting squinting portraits of Frank McCourt in lousy
light at the beehive huts, instead of simply asking him to move to a better
location. Joe was right. His lesson: A good photographer doesn't meekly accept
a bad situation if he or she can take charge and do something to improve it.
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