IAOI 04 – Drombeg Stone Circle

The next day, after a hearty ‘full Irish’ breakfast, we left Cork and in a gung-ho approach that we would ‘find somehere to stay when it gets dark’, we headed South-West. We had no agenda and no route to follow, we simply decided to follow where our hearts took us. After sometime on the road and not really heading for anywhere, Adrian suddenly whiplahsed round in the passenger seat and said “Ooh – Stone Circle!”

A brief conversation ensued along the lines of “Well, we are Stone Circle, we can’t come here and not see it. The universe provides!”

I found a spot to turn round and we headed back to where he had seen a signpost for Drombeg Stone Circle. Folowing a country lane we eventually arrived at a small car park where two or three other cars had parked up. After a short walk we came across the most amazing little spot, nestled in the hillside where stones, put there by men in 1100BC still stood to this day. A small circle by Stonehenge standards but made even more impressive by its remoteness and solitude in the Irish hills. It was truly awe inspiring to think that ancient men had chosen this spot to create this meeting place and that we had stumbled on it purely by accident. Maybe we were meant to.

We spent a good hour or two here, just wandering around, connecting with the rocks and slowly became aware of other stones set out in the ground, less obvious to the casual observer. From what we saw, this was clrearly not just a meeting place but a small settlement and the ramains of stone huts could still be seen. A natural spring provided water to the site and this had been caefully coralled into a water-hole. In this time of consumerism and the disposable society, it was humbling to see that what other men had created over three thousand years ago, still endured.