Drove up into the Cooley mountains today through strange weather - sunshine one minute, fog the next.
There are lots of old abandoned farmhouses along the lanes which criss-cross the mountains. They fascinate
me. I wonder what stories the old stones could tell, what events they were silent witnesses to. The Famine?
The War of Independence? The Civil War? The World Wars?
No doubt history played a part in their decline. Emigration has long been a feature in Irish society so perhaps
the occupants left to seek a better life overseas. Late marriages and bachelor farmers may have resulted in
no heirs to take them over, or they slowly became derelict as disagreements over wills dragged on indefinitely.
The desire for the new saw these old houses abandoned in favour of a modern bungalow, often constructed with little thought as to how it might blend in with the landscape.