Three little maids

Lads! What a day! Himself was up at 6.30, I needed a cuppa first - and then we were on the road to Ballyvourney, arriving in true English fashion early and of course In true Irish fashion things did not go quite to timing and started late and finished much later than scheduled! With no coffee break! However, the talks were mighty with a range of subjects from Gobnait herself, to Ogham writing to bees (St Gobnait is patron saint of bees), fortunately mainly in English though Ballyvourney is in the Gaeltacht and it was lovely to hear so much Irish being spoken.

The highlight was the Bishop blessing the new statues of St Gobnait. Skip this bit if you're not interested in 13th century statues - what there are people who aren't - but you may or may not remember, one of the major things about St Gobnait's feast day is that the extraordinary oak  statue of the saint is laid out on a crisp white linen table cloth in the church and pilgrims queue up to wrap her in ribbons that have been cut especially to her length. Its complicated! Anyway, the statue is very ancient and very worn and last year it was decided to try and make a replica of it that could go on permanent display in the church.  Commissions were sent out and a 3D model was made (far right) and a replica was also made, painted as she may have originally looked (far left)  I was nervous as I thought it might look Disneyish or that the original might be forever banned to a cupboard in the priest's cubbyhole but no - she looks wonderful, a  painstaking job based on scrupulous research. 
We fell out of the hall at around 2pm and proceed with indecent haste to the Mills inn where  coffee, soup and chips were downed in record time. We were ravenous. 
Tomorrow is the proper feast day - this was just the warm up - and yes I will go back for it has to be done. 
The other extra is of all the women in the room who are called Gobnait! 
Should you be madly fascinated just follow the tag.