Dreamcatcher
County Mayo
Ireland
2019

I suppose church builders who put large windows in sanctuaries do so in part with the intent of inspiring the congregation with the flood of light. But they also offer a good place for those less attentive folks in the crowd to focus their daydreams.

A Life of Contrasts
County Mayo, Ireland
2019

The ruins of abbeys and priories that we visited are largely roofless, giving the false impression that such places were well lit back in the day. But a visit to one with some roofs still intact or restored quickly dispels that notion. With the exception of a few smaller rooms with a single window and the large common areas such as sanctuaries that often have a number of large windows, it was dark in those rooms! As the interior lighting in that day would only have consisted of candles and fires in fireplaces, life must have been a stark contrast between the bright days outside the buildings and the darkness of time spent indoors.

Parts Room
County Mayo, Ireland
2019

Many of the ruins we visited in Ireland are under the care of the government and most of those ruins had a “spare parts” room that was gated off where they piled all the miscellaneous pieces of graves, walls, and other features that had been lying about the place when it was tidied up for the public to visit. That they were put away for safe keeping suggests that there is at least a theoretical (i.e., non-funded) interest in eventually restoring the place a bit.

Moyne Friary Cloisters
County Mayo
Ireland
2019

The Universal Plant
County Mayo
Ireland
2019

The agave does not grow everywhere but I don’t know that I’ve traveled anywhere there is a moderate to warm or hot climate that does not sport some agave plants, either in neighborhood landscaping or formal gardens or greenhouses. That ubiquity is o.k. by me as I have yet to tire photographing them.

Country Road
County Mayo
Ireland
2019

The Lesson
County Mayo
Ireland
2019

Ocean View, Every Room #2
Downpatrick Head, County Mayo
Ireland
2019

This shot gives a better idea of the overall size of the rookery and cliffs at Downpatrick Head. It also shows (or would if it is viewed larger) that it is a partially integrated neighborhood, with a colony of guillemots living adjacent to the fulmars on the right-hand end of the long shelf in the middle of the photo.

Ocean View, Every Room
Downpatrick Head, County Mayo
Ireland
2019

There’s not a bad view to be found on this ocean cliff fulmar rookery.

Far Afield #2
Downpatrick Head, County Mayo
Ireland
2019