Travel
Ireland for Holidays
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The Free State
THOSE who think of holidays in Ireland just now are thinking. like myself of salmon-fishing ; and I may just note that the price of salmon waters in Ireland is rising fast. Two acquaint- ances of mine have taken fishings at Irish prices and sub-let for such periods as they could not fish themselves at the Scottish rate : result, they have their fishing for nothing, or next to nothing.
But the general body of anglers, the less pecunious tribe for, whom I write, may be reminded that in Ireland there is still plenty of free sahnon fishing. Not so many rivers ; but the Caragh in Kerry, fishable from the Glencar Hotel (with a charge so low as to be negligible), the Clare-Galway, fishable from Tuam, and the Leman, fishable from Taylor's Hotel at Kilmacrenan, or from John O'Grady's cottage at Lough Fern, are all three good rivers, and Lennan and Caragh both fish early. The Clare-Galway would scarcely count before May, but has the adVantage of holding also fine trout ; a dry-fly river. Lough Cloon, from which the Caragh flows, and Lough Fern (fishable either from Kihnaerenan or Milford, where MeCrea,dy's Hotel is a special attraction) both give fair chances of getting two or three fish in the day : Cloon by spinning ; Lough Fern only by the fly.
But, I wish not to be too limited in my views and to think of the general holiday-maker—to whom no place says more than Killarney. Well, there are few better chances of a spring salmon than the lakes there offer, free to all who have a salmon licence (it costs two pounds for any place in the Free State); and moreover for trout fishers, who need no licence, Killarney in April or May is a really good fishing, not for big trout but for half-pounders. They run smaller there than at Glencar, but Lough Acoos at Glencar is the perfect place to take a schoolboy to catch herring-sized trout, and from April to June he can .catch them by dozens. So are the lakes at Gartan in Donegal, headwaters of the Leman, and the Si. Columb's Hotel there (an old rectory) actually on the lovely lake, is a pleasant place to be in.
I scarcely need to say that anyone who fishes at Killarney, or at Glencar, or at Gartan, will be among scenery of the most romantic beauty, and in a perfect centre for mountain walking. Glencar is on the slopes of Carrantuohil, our highest peak ; and a. stout walk it is to ,reach the top, and marvellous the view- from it. Lough Fern is less scenic, but has its own beauty, and within easy reach of Milford are the sea loughs, Mulroy, Sheephaven, and Lough Swilly : choose among them for beauty and delight. I add that spinning with a sand-eel for sea-trout in Mulroy or Sheephaven in April is likely to give such fishing as one seldom gets. Sheephaven is more accessible from Rosapenna, where there is one of our more expensive hotels, or from Portnablah or Dunfanaghy, where the accom- modation is cheaper ; and just beside Dunfanaghy is Purt Lake with good pink trout ; while Rosapenna offers its guests the chance of both trout and salmon in the Lackagh (another early river) and Glen Lough.
I am writing in spite of myself for. anglers, but there is not one of the places I have named which I would not commend to the holiday-maker who never threw a fly and—God pity him !—never wanted to. Beautiful places all of them, with friendly, pleasant people. There is golf of the best at Rosa- penna ' • less good, but still golf, at Portnablah and Dun- fanaghy. Killarney and Glenear are linkless, but twenty miles beyond Killarney on the shore of Dingle Bay the Glen- beigh Hotel has a nine-holes links at hand with every natural advantage ; it has also two charming little rivers and half-a- dozen trout lakes, and is one of the best appointed little hotels I ever saw in Ireland ; its garden is a dream of beauty ; there was a myrtle tree some thirty foot high, growing like a pine, and covered with blossom when I saw it last July.
From a motorist's point of view (so far as I can judge, who am only one of the driven), Ireland should be the paradise. The Free State Government when it emerged from its troubles spent several millions on the main roads, and while you keep to these you have a perfect surface, and you have it to yourself. There is no crowding anywhere ; even the roads from Dublin into Wicklow will seem empty to, anyone accustomed to English traffic. The by-roads, which are innumerable, are macadam, and, in general, better in the mountainy and pic- turesque regions than in richer parts where cart traffic wears them.
The formalities for getting a motor into the Free State are the same as those for the Continent; the Customs people are I think everywhere friendly and civil.
Ulster, or to speak by the card, Northern Ireland, has of course no barrier to those coming from Great Britain ; but you cannot go in and out of the Six Counties without the transit forms. Except for motorists there is no bother in passing from the Free State into Northern Ireland, barring the usual Customs examination. And, I need hardly say that Ulster's sea-bordering counties, Derry, Down and Antrim, offer as great attraction to the holiday-maker as anything in Kerry, Connemara or Donegal. Portrush is a kind of metro- polis for Irish golfers. Newcastle runs it close, and has the superb mass of the Mourne Mountains at hand for an added delight. Ballycastle, near Fair Head, with its basalt cliffs, commands the Giant's Causeway as easily as does Portrush (for that matter, there are good hotels at the Causeway) and is a thoroughly well-appointed little watering-place with golf, la-Cm tennis, and all the rest of it—and the adorable Glens of Antrim stretching south of it for some forty miles to Larne. Old readers of the Spectator will recollect many of Moira O'Neill's " Songs of the Glens " making their first appearance in its columns—nearer forty years ago than thirty ; and the songs are as alive to-day as ever. The Glens of Antrim Hotel at Ctishendall is close by Cushendun where they were written, and is one of the hostelries most held in affection.
I have said nothing of the West : the mountainous island Achill, with its dividing Sound; now bridged by rail, leading to good little inns ; Killary, Bay, perhaps the very finest of our sea-loughs, with McKeown's Hotel at Leenan, a great resort of anglers ; Clifden at the north of Galway Bay, " the next parish to America " ; and Galway itself, the most picturesque town in Ireland, with its really good Railway Hotel. Galway com- mands Lough Corrib, though fishermen on that best of our fishing lakes stay generally at Oughterard or Cong ; but as a centre for excursions, I know nothing to approach Galway— with one exception—Dublin itself.
For wherever you- may go in Ireland, or out of it, you will scarcely see anything more beautiful than Dublin Bay with the Howth Peninsula shooting out an arm to the north, and Killiney Hill and Bray Head answering to the south with exquisite delicacy of peaked line. An hour's walking from the tram lines will take you on to grouse moors; an hour's motor-bus will land you in the centre of all icklow's culti- vated loveliness at Powerscourt, or of its wilder beauty at Glendalough or Glennialure.
There is to-day hardly any place in _Ireland which you can- not reach by motor-bus from Dublin ; one runs to Relmullet, on the last limits of the land, beyond Blacksod Bay ; and there is a good hotel there. Another will take you to Limerick to see the Shannon put into harness by a wonderful engineering feat. But there is too much in Dublin to see for anyone to run away from it: the Phcenix 'Park to stroll in ; all the noble eighteenth-century architecture to study ; two of the best picture galleries in these islands ; the Abbey Theatre going stronger than ever—and Sivift's epitaph to look at in St. Patrick's.
And—if it is necessary to say this once more—there is no country in Europe (not even Northern Ireland) where the English visitor will be surer of welcome than -the Irish Free
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