We saw a couple more ruins of Abbeys today, with their accompanying graveyards. Impressive stone work.
Also we stopped at a pretty brick-work schoolhouse-turned-museum. It was closed.
Gorgeous Gardens
We also visited the grounds of a still-lived-in castle. It has 120 acres of manicured landscaping, thousands of kinds of trees and flowering bushes, two rivers converging, numerous bridges, the ancient spring of Saint Brenden, and an enormous telescope built by the third earl of this family. It was the largest in the world for seventy years, and allowed the discovery of new galaxies.
The telescope set up, now rusting away.
Birr Castle set in its own moat
One of numerous redwood trees, from California, 200 Years old. It would take at least three men’s outstretched arms to encircle this trunk. I didn’t have three men on hand to demonstrate.
Saint Breden’s Well
A cherry tree lane, just starting to bloom.
A wishing well. “ You can wish for love, but not for money.”
The inside walls of the well structure, with shells from the mistress’s collection.
One log. Two seats. Impressive piece.
And more tomorrow, D.v.
Who was the astronomer discovering galaxies?
ReplyDeleteHow did the California redwood get there??
That shell mosaic in the well-- took a good amount of time and skill to make!
Wow, what an amazing place! I can't even imagine a life in a place like that...
ReplyDeleteThe astronomer was Mr William Parsons, the 3rd Earl of Rosse himself. His wife Mary was also extremely accomplished and their son invented numbers of things in industry.
ReplyDeleteThe redwoods were smuggled over as seeds in a hat (if I have the correct grand house story on this – at least one place did that). These people traveled a lot.