Connemara is one of those special Irish landscapes that takes hold of the imagination. Prepare for any weather, and its pace will find you, says Pól Ó Conghaile Connemara: Ireland’s wild west, where all four seasons are flung at us in a few hours “That’s the first monastery built in Ireland in over 400 years,” a lady in Kylemore Abbey’s ticket office tells me. “The nuns just moved in last week.
” It’s a busy summer’s day at Connemara’s anchor attraction, and builders are finishing up on a new base for its Benedictine nuns. Nearby, the car parks are chock-a-block with cars, campervans and coaches. A steady stream of visitors is filing through the 150-year-old castle’s exhibition rooms, catching shuttle buses to and from its rejuvenated walled gardens, browsing the gift shop and queuing for snacks at its cafe and tearooms.
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