A soft Monday

The Irish name for what we might call an overcast drizzling day is a “soft day”. On a day like this the thousand shades of green in the landscape are gorgeous.
And, the rain is warm and the air clean .
We returned for another visit to Gobnait’s Holy Well where the ancient trees and spring wildflowers frame the
Pilgrims prayer ribbons and remembrances .
We collected holy water from the Holy Well to bring home with us .
And, we made our way down long country lanes to the tiny local cheese factory that produces 30 tons annually of Coolea cheese now shipped around the world .
Famous for its lovely flavour and made with two ingredients; milk from cows pasture grazed locally and whey.
The owner was happy to tell us he had just sent a large shipment to his marketer in London where it would be resent to Ukraine as his gift to the Ukrainian people.

When we returned to the Mills we found that we had Irish Census forms waiting for us to complete because today is the day across Ireland to identify every person in the country including visitors.
The experience was quite different than our US census because it included almost exclusively questions about our care for others and work and volunteer lives and nothing at all about our property.Read more