Summer in the City

May Day dawned dampish and grey but I washed my face in the dew to ensure continued radiance then headed off to The City, just  across the border in County Kerry. All you need to know about this extraordinary place can be found here  - an excellent website where you can do clever things like move around. The City, is basically an enormous stone cashel, or ringfort, associated with the pagan goddess Crobh Dearg - the Red Claw. . It's meant to be one of the most continuously venerated sites in Ireland and inside contains: the remains of a possible megalithic tomb, an enigmatic earthen mound, a penitential station, an ogham stone, a cross inscribed altar (main pic) , the ruins of the Keeper's cottage and a statue of Our Lady of the Wayside (with a seriously scary baby Jesus). Just outside the circle is the holy well. It is a Bealtine site - the one where bonfires were lit and cattle  driven through to ensure their health. Humans visit too, especially on May Day, and pilgrims were steady -paths mown through the interior and a pile of cups handy at the well. And there was a triskel (three spiral motif) in the well! 
All this and the site nestles under the Paps of Anu, two breast shaped mountains topped with nipply cairns associated with the Earth goddess   - both lost in the mists today.

Daphne, the helpful Google map lady, knew I was on a search for the BVM (it's one of her days too). Take me home I instructed and somehow she managed to bring me past two other extraordinary sites dedicated to the BVM -  I wont go on but I did have an interesting encounter at one with an immaculately dressed elderly lady who had come all the way down from Limerick city to collect some water. Trying not to be be too nosy I wondered how she might use it? She explained she put it in her holy water font and sprinkled it around the house as required.

I'm well vibed up now!
And some music from the area