Ah, Ireland, the Emerald Isle. Home of Wilde, Yeats, and Joyce. It’s a magical fairytale filled with charm, history, castles, rolling green pastures and wild coastline. If you’re looking for a truly authentic Irish adventure (away from the tour busses and crowds), here are five ways to travel Ireland, feel like a local and tap into the magic.

1. Stay at Powerscourt Hotel & Gardens

A mere 30-minute taxi from Dublin and just a short bike ride away from charming Enniskerry, you’ll be transported into a romantic land of royal gardens, waterfalls, and private river paths. Recognized by National Geographic as one of the top ten gardens in the world, its lush 47 acres of landscaped garden bliss are full of “secret hollows and rambling walks” to explore. Powerscourt Hotel with its Palladian-style architecture is a stakeholder in Ireland’s sustainability efforts. New energy efficient lights save more than 831 tonnes of CO2 annually and it formed a new partnership with The Cool Planet Experience to help prevent global warming.

2. Explore Mayo County’s Castles & Heritage Houses

“Stunning dramatic unspoilt landscape, friendly locals and a region steeped in culture and heritage, Mayo is the place to go to discover the true Ireland” says Rachel Nolan, owner of Rachel’s Irish Adventures. Stay in one of Mayo County’s Blue Book castle hotels and manors like Enniscoe House, a classical Georgian surrounded by woods on the shore of Lake Conn. It’s home to an organic Victorian garden and dates back to the 1790s. Dinner at Enniscoe House is quite an intimate affair and begins with a drink beside a roaring fireplace. Ashford Castle’s 340 acres of jaw-dropping gardens and 18th-century decor are also a must-see. Dating back to 1228, treat yourself to views of the castle from Lake Corrib on a charming boat tour with a local captain regaling its history and lore. Then warm up with one the finest Irish coffees in Ireland at the iconic Prince of Wales bar.

3. Take the Art Tour at The Merrion Hotel in Dublin

What would be an art tour in Ireland without first a discussion over tea? In the heart of Dublin, the Merrion Hotel, composed of four impeccably restored Georgian townhouses, launched an audio Art Tour concept that begins with afternoon tea in their luxurious drawing room. Next, the tour takes guests through an immersive journey of the hotel’s 19th and 20th-century master works featuring Irish and European artists. Once finished, if you find the experience requires more contemplation, take the inspired conversation down to The Merrion’s iconic Cellar Bar and Restaurant; an original 18th-century wine vault transformed into a popular pub.

4. Drive the ‘Monasteries of the Moy’ Route

There’s not much more of a mystical experience than emerald green pastures dotted with ancient monasteries along the River Moy. Drive the 14km route between Ballina and Killala and prepare to be swept back in time. Some highlights of the drive include: Moyne Abbey, Augustinian Abbey, and the Priory of the Holy Cross at Rathfran. If you prefer to cycle, the Monasteries of the Moy Greenway is near completion and takes you from Ballina all the way to the village of Killala. Complete with an easy stop at the Connacht Distillery for Irish whiskey tasting.

5. Taste the Irish Artisanal Foodie Renaissance  

It’s not just pub food anymore. Ireland has gone through an artisanal foodie renaissance where you’ll find farm-fresh organic dishes that combine the very best of Irish traditions with new flavors. Even Irish oats have gone gourmet. Mary Flahavan, matriarch of Flahavan’s, Ireland’s beloved brand of sustainable oatmeal; her Oaty Shortbread Biscuit recipe was featured in the famed MacNean Restaurant Cookbook. And top locales like the Icehouse Hotel and Spa in Ballina, have committed to buying local. The food world (including Alice Waters of Chez Panisse) has taken note of Ireland’s foodie artisanal renaissance.

Truly, there’s no place like Ireland. The Emerald Isle’s wild and wonderful beauty will capture your heart while the Irish locals’ natural penchant for easy conversation and a hearty laugh will endear you forever. Combine that with Ireland’s castles, gardens, and Georgian charm, you’re in for quite a magical experience.

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Images via The Merrion, Ashford Castle, The IceHouse and Tourism Ireland 

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Ireland did it. The country said “yes” to gay marriage over the weekend.

Needless to say, it was a happy, celebratory occasion. We couldn’t be more happy about this big shift and hope more countries do this soon, too. Watch some footage after the gay marriage vote came in below.

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Bringing meaning to the joy of eating.

When the “An apple a day keeps the doctor away” proverb is the only adage in your arsenal of food wisdom, it’s time to bulk up on new things to say. From Ireland to China and the likes of Helen Keller to Ronald Reagan, these 20 quotes will bring even more meaning and joy to the act of eating.

When I am eating I am deaf and dumb. –Russia

To eat is human, to digest, divine. –Mark Twain

Life is too short to drink bad wine. –France

Whose bread I eat, his song I sing. –Germany

Too many cooks spoil the broth. –Italy

At the table with good friends and family you do not become old. –Italy

If you can’t feed a hundred people, then just feed one. –Mother Theresa

Fine words do not produce food. –Nigeria

If you are looking for a fly in your food, it means that you are full. –South Africa

Avoid fruits and nuts. You are what you eat. –Jim Davis (Garfield)

Who fasts but does no other good saves his bread but goes to hell. –Italy

There is no sincerer love than the love of food. –Bernard Shaw

He who takes medicine and neglects to diet wastes the skill of his doctors. –China

It is easier to halve the potato when there’s love. –Ireland

A piece of bread in one’s pocket is better than a feather in one’s hat. –Sweden

You can tell a lot about a fellow’s character by his way of eating jelly beans. –Ronald Reagan

Give a man a fish, you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and you have fed him for a lifetime. –China

The good Lord has changed water into wine, so how can drinking beer be a sin? –Belgium

Happiness rarely keeps company with an empty stomach. –Helen Keller

Food tastes best when you eat it with your own spoon. –Denmark

Images: B@ni

Aylin Erman currently resides in Istanbul and is creator of plant-based recipe website GlowKitchen.

Check out our article on 50 pick up lines for foodies

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Critics warn that large-scale eco-communities aren’t all they’re hyped up to be.

Conventional wisdom has it that despite Simon & Garfunkel’s harmonies to the contrary, no man or woman could possibly get by in this world living as a rock or an island.

Sustainability activists have applied that same logic to eco-villages, communities of intentionally-minded neighbors who share the same code of social ethics or the goal of achieving total or relative self-sufficiency. Translation: Despite all of your personal homesteading, composting, upcycling and permaculturing efforts, one-off sustainability is simply not enough to make a meaningful impact on the world. Rather, it takes a village to raise the world to a higher standard of living.

The Eco Village of Cloughjordan, Ireland’s first and only official eco-village, is one such experiment in sustainability. While residents and environmentalists have raved about its many virtues, building community being chief among them, critics and detractors wonder if large-scale developments of its sort make good sense or contribute to an environment of idealistic wastelands.

The Eco Village, In Context

Robert Gilman, founding editor of Utne Reader fave IN CONTEXT, A Quarterly of Humane Sustainable Culture, is considered the godfather of the modern eco-village, which shares its roots with the anarchist naturism philosophies of Thoreau, the “back to the earth” hippie communes of the ’60s and even Yamagishism, a Japanese income-sharing movement in which the quest for happiness takes place on rural communes called “jikkenchi.”

To Gilman, a functioning eco-village is human-scale, fully featured, healthfully and harmoniously integrated into the environment, and future-oriented. The Village at Cloughjordan, with a maximum capacity of 130 homes in the Irish countryside built from ecological materials like timber, lime, hemp, and cob construction (earth mixed with straw), certainly declares itself to be that. They’re on their own energy grid, each resident is allotted 100 square meters to grow their own food, and according to village spokesperson Dave Flannery, “The car is backgrounded or as we say, the ‘car is a guest.’ The eco-village is designed around people and the family.”

Sounds lovely, but it’s been a long haul.

A Great Idea, Caught In the Eye of the Tiger

In 1999, founding members eagerly bought in committing up to £30,000 apiece, paid to the non-profit Sustainable Projects Ireland Ltd., for a piece of what looked like a modern day utopian dream. Come 2007, all 130 of its plots had been committed, but by then the Celtic Tiger economy had devolved into a pussycat.

Houses got bigger, amenities got more costly. In their wake, inflated property and construction costs pushed the original move-in costs up to three times higher than what the members had originally bargained for. Dystopia ensued. Spearheaded by self-professed village renegade, Joey Cleary, almost half the membership decided to leave.

“Basically, the project was claiming to be opposite of what was going on in Ireland, but in the end it got caught up in the same property speculation,” Cleary says. “It was a real moment of truth. The direction we were going in was economically unsustainable.”

Cleary, who’s now living as an expat in Barcelona, runs a private online community for ex-members like him.

Sustaining “Wealth”

Alanna Moore, a permaculture writer, farmer and teacher who’s lived in numerous intentional communities throughout Ireland and Australia, wrote a rather biting review of The Village as well, after she and a group of other curious tourists toured the site. Her biggest gripe, she wrote, “[it’s] too big and too concrete, [and that] makes for non-eco-friendly homes. A depressing sight with more in common with a modern unsustainable city environment than a friendly eco-village. Would people really want to be in such a soul free environment?”

Cement is an influential billion-dollar industry in Ireland and the material was used liberally in housing construction during the Tiger years. Environmentally, however, it comes at a cost producing more than 5% of global emissions of carbon dioxide. It also contributes to higher energy costs because it is so expensive to heat, especially given Ireland’s winter climate.

In a separate conversation with EcoSalon, Moore also talked about economic sustainability. When she first started living in sustainable communities during the 1980s, she says, “I was a single parent and saw them as a great way to raise children. We were poor, but poverty is a state of mind. We were wealthy in terms of fresh air and growing your own food and living among gorgeous rainforests, swimming holes and creeks.”

Echoing Cleary’s broader economic perspective, she says, “The Tiger Era boom was totally unsustainable and you can’t use the same sort of thinking to create a sustainable community.”

The Village of Tomorrow

For their part, the Village is now reducing the price on some of its sites to make them more affordable. They are also exploring co-housing as an option.

Moreover while revitalizing one’s own existing community is the more eco-friendly avenue to take, residents, who in addition to Ireland hail from England, Canada, Germany, Japan and the United States, don’t seem to mind living in what Moore describes as “An ivory green tower.”

Deirdre O’Brolchain, who moved to The Village from Dublin with her husband and two young boys in 2010, feels right at home. “Fundamentally,” she says, “sustainable communities don’t happen on a small scale. [It takes] diversity in numbers on a large scale.”

Indeed, as Seneca said and Joey Cleary’s ex-member’s board reminds us, “No man can live happily who regards himself alone; who turns everything to his own advantage. You must live for others if you wish to live for yourself.”

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Perhaps the luck of the Irish will help make green dreams come true when it comes to the country’s goal to shift away from fossil fuels. Situated at the end of the supply chain and currently 90 percent dependent on imported oil, Ireland hopes to get 40 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2020 – far exceeding the EU’s target of 16 percent.

But luck might not be necessary in a nation driven by an urgent need for employment. Ireland sees its financial difficulties and depressed economy not as a hurdle to going green, but a major motivator. Switching to wind power and other renewables would not only provide thousands of jobs, but stabilize dramatic swings in oil and gas prices. Additionally, Ireland’s prospects are looking far sunnier than its trademark misty gray skies.

“We have doubled our renewable energy. We can double it and double it again,” says Eamon Ryan, Ireland’s minister for communications, energy and natural resources. “It is the perfect answer to the recessionary blues.”

Of course, it’s not as simple as throwing up some wind turbines and calling it a day. Just as it is here in America, one of the biggest obstacles is an aging electrical grid – but a grid interconnector directly from Ireland to Britain is currently being built, and with an energy minister who’s devoted to renewables, more improvements are sure to come.

What’s the biggest thing this island nation has going for it? Shoreline, and lots of it. Ireland has enough land and ocean space to provide its own wind power and even have enough to export to other countries. Five offshore wind farm projects are in the pipeline and marine energy is a possibility in the future.

Ireland is looking beyond the estimated $1.33 billion price tag, seeing it as an investment in the future – for both its people and the environment. Perhaps we should sit back and take some notes.

Image: Wikimedia Commons

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