A Ride in the Park

What would you consider to be an enjoyable ride? Would it be in a high speed, high performance car? Or, would you consider another type of ride? Would you consider the type of transportation that was in the British Isles prior to a hundred years ago?

Close your eyes and let your imagination take over. You are about to take a short trip with your significant other and you need to decide on the type of transportation that you are going to use. Are you going to use horses to race each other and get a “thrill” of a lifetime? Or, do you want something that is more romantic? Will you need transportation for just the two of you? Or, will there be a group of people going with you?

During the nineteenth century, there was a form of transportation used in Dublin that could be used with the help of one horse. It was a two-wheeled vehicle called a jaunting car and was designed to have a driver for the horse and to carry two or four people at a time. Samuel Coleridge made arrangements for one for a tour of Ireland with William Wordsworth, who named himself as driver, and Wordsworth’s sister, Dorothy. Apparently, Wordsworth did not do so well as a driver.

There were also two types of jaunting cars, outside jaunting cars and inside jaunting cars. If you are in an outside jaunting car, you look out, across the wheels at the scenery. If you are in an inside jaunting car, you are sitting on the benches facing inwards towards your companions. Our group used about three jaunting cars and they were all inside jaunting cars.

Jaunting cars today are designed to carry between ten and twelve passengers and have four wheels instead of two wheels. They are still pulled by one horse and are used mostly by tourists. The companies in Killarney take their passengers out to Ross Castle in Killarney National Park. They give their passengers enough time to visit the castle and the castle grounds before taking them back to their hotels. Almost all of the jaunting cars in Killarney have overhead protection from rain if there is no wind. The car that I was in also had plastic walls that gives better protection in the rain.

On the way out to Ross Castle, I rode in the back. It gave me a chance to experience what the ride was like in the back. Seriously, though, I wanted to ride up front, but I know how selfish I can be, so I chose to sit in the back so that someone else could have the privilege. The person who sat with the driver decided that she felt that the wind was too cold for her and wanted to go into the back with everyone else. I jumped at the chance to ride in the front and I don’t regret doing it. I had a chance to talk with the driver one-on-one and actually had a chance to drive the horse for about ten minutes.

We arrived back at our hotel with time enough for a quick break, and then we were off to our next adventure. I would suggest that anyone who visits Ireland and doesn’t go on a jaunting ride when given the chance, is not experiencing all that Ireland has to offer. I enjoyed the ride and the chance to actually drive the horse. If I come across the chance to do it again, I will not be missing the chance to repeat my experience.

Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge

One of the sites that we stopped to see was the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge. You can have enough time to visit Giant’s Causeway as well as this rope bridge in one day and still have time to visit another minor site or two. There has been a bridge at this site since approximately 1755. The site is now owned by the National Trust who maintain the bridge and, depending on the weather, allow people to cross it for a fee.

The Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge was originally used during salmon fishing season as the salmon swim by the island of Carrickarede during this time. The fishermen would catch their salmon while on the island and then use the rope bridge to carry the fish over to the mainland. Fishing was carried on right up to 2002. There is no fishing done now due to the low numbers of salmon. In the past, 300 salmon were caught in a day. The last year that there was any fishing, there were only 300 salmon caught in the whole season.

The bridge itself used to be two ropes strung between the mainland and Carrickarede Island, one rope where you would “walk” or do a sideways shuffle, and the other rope, which was in a higher position, to hold onto to keep your balance and not fall into the sea. Yes, it was more treacherous when it was only the two ropes. Anyone who has done any Scouting may have constructed such a bridge over minor creeks or small, shallow rivers.

There is plenty of wild life to observe. The wild life consists of: seabirds, basking sharks, dolphins, and porpoises. The seabirds include: guillemots, razorbills, kittiwakes and fulmars as well as oystercatchers. Puffins breed on Rathlin Island every year. There is also a salmon fishery that includes a fisherman’s cottage.

There is also The Weighbridge Tearoom in which you can get a refreshment of a beverage and cake as a reward for crossing the bridge. I cannot say how tasty the cake is as this was the same day that I twisted my ankle at Giant’s Causeway and did not want to do any further damage to my ankle.

There is an old chalk quarry called Larrybane which was a working quarry until the mid 1970s. Now it is the access point for a scenic walk to your adventure.

If you are interested in wildflowers, there are a number of different types that include at least three different types of orchids.

This site can give a look into the past and can demonstrate the working life of a salmon fisherman in Antrim. Did your ancestor rely on the sea to feed his family? This might be a good place for you to mentally connect with him.

The National Library of Ireland

One of the places that I visited to do some research was the National Library of Ireland. I was able to walk to get to the library as it was only about four blocks from our hotel in Dublin. As I was walking there, a couple of people happened to notice that I held a map in my hand and wanted to know if they could help me. The first person that noticed was just before I reached the street for my final turn. The second person stopped me just steps from the library.

I just want to let you know that not only do they have a genealogical research service, by this I mean that they have a couple of genealogists who assist people by directing where they can find the records that they are looking for, but they also provide research materials for other purposes. These records could be either in English or Irish or copies could be found in both languages. This pretty much applies to the Irish Republic as a whole.

They do have a website, http://www.nli.ie/ , that you can go to and look for yourself to see if they hold the publication that you are looking for. There is a section of the website that is dedicated to genealogy which has a number of pages to it. The first page of the genealogical section is labelled “Getting started” and has links to the Catholic Parish Registers that are held at the NLI and the census and civil records. They also recommend that you read their booklet which they provide a link to a pdf copy that you can download. They also provide links to the General Register Office and to the FamilySearch.org website.

If you click on the link for the NLI sources, you will see a list of the sources that they have available. This list includes:

Catholic parish registers

Property records

Newspapers

Directories

Heraldry

Other sources

They also provide free access to subscription websites such as Find My Past and Ancestry. There may be other websites than these two, but I did use Ancestry while I was there.

The section for the Genealogy Advisory Service gives a listing when you can get some advice about your research. I used it and they gave me advice on their holdings.

There is a section for Genealogy Events. However, there is nothing listed at this time. I would imagine that if “Who Do You Think You Are – Live!” were to visit Ireland, this would be listed in this section.

The next section to look at is Family History and Memoir Writing. The library works in conjunction with Irene Graham in offering workshops and lectures on memoir writing. I would think that this would be similar to the writing group that the British Isles Family History Society of Greater Ottawa has as a special interest group. There is a link to upcoming events as well as a link to Irene Graham’s website.

If you are interested in commissioning someone to do some research for you, the library does not offer this service but does provide a list of over 65 private individuals and organizations who will be happy to help you.

If you click on the Links button, you will get a rather long list of links of various websites ranging from main repositories to websites to government registries to almost anything that you can think of to find the records that you need.

Last, but not least, is the FAQs page. It lists twelve frequently asked questions that are answered below the list.

All in all, I think that the National Library of Ireland has a well organized website with regards to family history. They provide information, databases, and references to the things that they do not have in their repository. I am starting to think that I should have taken some time before going to Ireland and gone through their website. I know that I was not prepared to do a lot of research when I travelled there last month, but I did know this and used the time to acquaint myself with the facilities that Dublin offers the family historian. I am doing some of this basic research now as, being part of a tour group, there was only a very limited time to do any research.

My suggestion to anyone even remotely planning a research trip to Ireland is to start with the websites for the National Library of Ireland and the National Archives of Ireland. Then, you can branch from there, either online or in person.