Finding the Thrills

In these latitudes the world around, the hot weeks at end of July and early August hold traditions for berry picking and courting. It's when grain crops are ripening but not ready to harvest, and farming people can get a break.

It's time for a party. 

In Ireland the last Sunday of July was known as "Bilberry Sunday" after a shrub with a tiny berry similar to the North American blueberry. In this part of Ireland, they use the Scots Gaelic name for it, "bleaberry," and celebrated on the shore of Lough Salt. 

("Lough Salt" is the anglicization of the Irish for "high lake;" it has nothing to do with salinity. The lake feeds the local drinking water system.)

Lough Salt and its mountain are not too far from where we live.

 

This is what the mountain looks like from our neighborhood. It's that shield-shaped mountain in the center. I noticed it there on the horizon yesterday when we took at walk at Ards Friary.

Earlier that morning, I had tried to climb it. 

 

 

 

I first read about Bleaberry Sunday traditions in The Foot o' the Hill, Tales from the Townlands of Lough Salt Mountain by Jim Nisbet. Published in 2021, I found it at the local grocery store and it is a treasure chest of local history, legends, and gossip. Everything you want in a local history book. 

 

 

Blaeberry Sunday

The last Sunday of July and the first Sunday of August once paid homage to an age-old custom, when parties from the parishes of Kilmacrenan, Termon, Mevagh, and Doe would gather for picnics at Lough Salt to celebrate Bleaberry Sunday.

 

 

Originally a pagan harvest festival dedicated to the Celtic god Lugh, the day entailed a climb to the crest of the Lough Salt mountain, to pick and eat bilberries which, at that time, great bounteous on its breas. Seen as a sign of Mother Earth's covenent with her children, quantities of fresh bilberries were strung on stalks of grass and taken home to those who were unable to scale the 1,546 peak. 

 

Photo: National Library of Ireland

 

 

 

The Derry Journal, of August 1908, had this to say about a pleasant day on the roof of Killmacrennan parish:

 

"On Sunday last, hundreds of young men and women of the surrounding districts, after hearing Mass at the various chapels, hastened to ascend the lofty mountain. After the party had reached the top, three ringing cheers were given and the customary greetings in Irish were exchanged. On a fine natural platform of good native granite, songs and readings in the old melifouous Gaelic tone were given, the ladies as usual taking a prominent part. The descent was then begun, and before separating, the entire party made the cliffs re-echo with the stirring strains of 'God Save Ireland.'

 

 

For most participants, however, the main attraction was the evening's entertainment, when multitudes amassed upon the banks, as bonfires blazed and piping flutes and fiddles played. Courting couples were very much in evidence, with gentlemen keen to impress the ladies by taking part in uprorious sporting contests and high-spirited carousing. Many "blaeberry marriages" were arranged on this grand, social celebration. Others simply came for the purpose of making enquiries regarding lost cattle or stray sheep. 

 

Lough Salt Breas

On Summer Sunday evenings up to this hills we go

The lads and lassies gather there from the vales below

And on the crags we'd sit and sing some fine old Irish lays

Or dance until the moon arose about Lough Salt Braes

 

 

At the northern end of Lough Salt, just before you drop down toward Glen and Carrickart, is the Dancing Knoll. Here's how Jim Nisbet tells it:

 

 

The Dancing Knoll

 

 

I think this might be the Dancing Knoll.

Open-air reels and jigs took place in the liveliest manner on a grassy hillock known as Ard na nDamsa, or the Dancing Knoll, which over-looked the rotund crater of Lough Reelan. For reasons of Irish irony, this ring-shaped lake reveled in the nickname of "the Devil's Punchbowl"—a stock joke of that time, being plumb full to the bring with nothing but the purest water. 

Sadly, the tradition no longer survives. Fashions flourish then fade, and with the advent of the First World War, followed by the revolt and unrest of the 1920s, the festival dwindled, and soon Blaeberry Sunday had become just another wistful memory.

 

 

Inspired by Jim's stories, yesterday I decided to walk up Lough Salt myself. The blaeberries no longer grow on the mountain, made extinct by sheep. But the heather was beautiful, and I saw a pretty bog moth near the stile. The internet says the path up the mountain is "good," but someone has driven an ATV up it and it's now eroded and slippery with scree. I was forced off the path too many times and it seemed like I was damaging the delicate heather and moss even further. 

 

Before heading back down I took this photo of the lake and 500 years of peat accumulation. 

 

 

As I sat there appreciating nature and hating people, I remembered the stone row on the other side of the lake. Stone rows are said to date to the Bronze age (3000 years ago), similar to stone circles. If I couldn't walk to the peak, I would console myself with giving the stone row a visit.

 

 

 Like other rows and circles I've visited, it's not visible from below. They set these stones on a small level place just down from the nearest hilltop. 

Class: Stone row
Townland: AN BEARNAS ÍOCHTARACH
Scheduled for inclusion in the next revision of the RMP: Yes
Description: Three stones form an alignment just over 4m in length and orientated 54°-234°. The stones decrease in height from SW to NE and are 1.2m, .83m and 0.15m respectively in height above present ground level. The smallest stone is .45m high above the bottom of the pit that has been dug around it. Situated in rough pasture land, on high ground overlooking Lough Salt. 


 

The berries are gone, the crowds and picnics are gone, but I did find this little friend:

 

 I found my thrill
On Blueberry Hill
On Blueberry Hill
When I found you

The moon stood still
On Blueberry Hill
And lingered until
My dream came true

The wind in the willow played
Love's sweet melody
But all of those vows you made
Were never to be

Though we're apart
You're part of me still
For you were my thrill
On Blueberry Hill