CianMcLiam

I just saw this posting before I left Dublin for Clonmel this morning, nice coincidence! I have passed the sign for the stone many times without seeing it, it points to a side road to your right coming from Cashel towards Clonmel but the help ends there. I drove up and down the road and saw nothing, after the second time I just thought ‘sod it’ and went back up once more since the crossroads on the other end has a sign for Cashel too. I just managed to catch a glimpse of it in a field to the right, the first gate after the sharp Z bend.

The gate into the field is now locked and wrapped with barbed wire, what was once a stile was blocked up with thorny branches. Nice. From the road side its easy to see the stone and the truly awful brick surround, maybe they have a grey rhino in the field and need to protect the public but in either case this stone has had its style severely cramped, a foresty plantation looks like its just about to swallow it up now too! A real pity, this would have been a wonderful stone with stunning views.

Things seem to be different at the moment for Kenmare stone circle, maybe its just the off-season for tourists but the space allotted for the circle seems delightfully neglected compared to the manicured grass in the pics posted previously. The grass is uncut and untidy, in its partly secluded enclosure on a cold, gloomy and wet bank holiday morning you could just about imagine you were not really a stones throw from the town centre. From a certain angle you could stand with your back to the shrubs and things seemed almost wild.

It’s a nice circle, its a pity the views are blocked in every direction but in its slightly overgrown state it was a pleasant surprise, I wasn’t expecting too much. I thought the shrubs were the low, flowery kind in neat arrangements, the taller tree like evergreens are the biggest annoyance at the site apart from the many crisp packets and coke bottles under the boulder burial.

In the village of Bweeng (on the road between Donoghmore and Mallow) there is a large tourist information board stuck to a wall that you will miss coming from the south but is quite obvious on the way through the village from the north. Quite a number of the large amount of ancient sites in the area are described, this stone row was one of two ‘fine examples’ of the type, the other being An Seisear (or Beenalacht on the sign). ‘Well’ I thought, ‘if its anything like An Seisear it needs a look!’.

Its not easy to find, you have to approach the OS co-ords from the south, through a farm house with two very large and very noisy Great Danes (no sneaking past this farm!) so do ask for ‘the three stones’ at the house (w465926). I was brought down through three fields by the 10 year old son who played ‘catch’ with a stone while I frantically took pics before the sun slid behind Bweengduff mountain. He also showed me a disused lime kiln, a very odd structure indeed.

The three stones are wildly mis-matched, the larger is over 10ft and the other two are pretty similar at around 5ft. The larger stone is set perpendicular in section to the two other stones in the line. I couldn’t see the horizon too good in either direction to evaluate what they might mark. The ground here has been heavily eroded so it looks like there’s about a foot of old ground level clinging to the base of the stones, packing stones are clearly visible and all the stones lean this way and that.

The farmer was very interested in the stones and even gave me directions to visit the Nursetown Beg Stones nearby which I had not heard of before.

I stopped by here on my way back from a flying visit to Cork, it looked quite close to the road on the map and near to a track. I hadn’t stopped before even though I pass every couple of weeks, the recent photos make it look like a bomb crater. I was feeling a little optimistic that things may have improved for this little circle but unfortunately the optimism didn’t pay off. This circle really has had it rough, and the damage seems to be ongoing, the interior of the circle is a trampled pond with jumbled stones sticking out all over the place. The outside isn’t any tidier but despite the damage and disfiguration it’s still possible to make out that this was a very nice circle with an unusual pair of portal stones. Or, maybe I was only able to see its former glory because I had seen photos of it in a more complete state on Anthony Weir’s site (as in link below)...

I didn’t enter the field that the circle was in as it had quite a few bullocks in it and a whopping great bull who made a sneaking advance and then a full scale charge, I had one of those horrible sinking feelings that the electric fence wouldn’t ‘work’ and for a moment I think the bull had the same thought judging by his fit of rage. I didn’t delay making my way back to the track only to find that the bullocks in the opposite field were not too keen on me and my tripod either and to my horror, their fence had already been trampled to the ground... If your planning on visiting here, be very cautious!