
Category Archives: County Mayo
Silent Sunday – 16th April 2023
Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #227 – Home Sweet Home
Too many places to choose from this week as Tina asks us where would we bring a visitor to our country? I have to narrow it down to our County – County Mayo, west of Ireland.
Firstly it would be our wild Atlantic coast. Always amazing no matter what time of year you visit.

So many beautiful spots to spend a day exploring.

The Mullet peninsula, where I spent much of this summer working, has lots of beautiful coast, but also stunning flora rich machair grassland, buzzing with insects.

Go a little bit inland and you can explore lakes and peatlands.

The woods are small, but perfect places for early spring or autumn strolls.

And just one more – the Great Western Greenway, 44 km of old railway track that you can cycle or walk free of traffic. Perfect any time of year.

Many thanks to Tina for letting us apprecate a bit of home sweet home.
Silent Sunday – 23rd October 2022
Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #218 – Over the Hill
There may be some rain over the hill.

Thanks to Donna of the Wind Kisses for this week’s challenge.
Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #215
For this week’s Len-artist challenge John asks for “Planes, Trains, and Automobiles… and the Places they take us” – but I have veered off topic a little to talk about places boats have taken me. In recent years, we have had a few interesting trips on boats – or at least the boats got us to our destination. The first trip was to Clare Island off the west coast of Ireland. A small ferry takes about 20 minutes to cross from mainland to the island.

The island is lovely. We visited in January – but the day was glorious and clear and the light beautiful.



Then home again on the ferry at sunset.


Our next island visit was to Inishbiggle. Also off the west coast, but a much smaller island – talking only about ten minutes in a small boat similar to the small boat in the picture below.

Here crossing over from the mainland.

The island is lovely, exceptionally quiet (there are not many families living on it now) and the only shame was all the abandoned cars (and tractors) that it is too expensive to remove and so are left to rust away.




Silent Sunday – 28th August 2022
Silent Sunday – 17th July 2022
Lens-Artists Challenge #183 – Memorable Events
There was just something special and memorable about this trip to the coast at the end of last summer. It was probably the last sunny day before the kids went back to school. Something about it just gave me a really warm feeling. It’s a beach we’ve been to before, though this time we choose the little secluded bay as opposed to the big strand. The day was perfect, sunny and warm.

The water was perfect for swimming.



And even when we got tired of the water, there were the dunes to explore, with their wonderful wildflowers.

And of course bumblebees – just to make the day.
