Brian Nolan #Storyteller #Galway #WalkingTours @bgnolan

Biker Bar, Galway.

In Irish myth, the number seven is the most magical of all...the face of The Dagda is hidden by seven cowls, people disappear to the Otherworld for a period of seven years....and, for just one day, every seven years, an island named Hy-Brasil, normally shrouded in impenetrable mist, appears off Ireland's Atlantic coast 🌊 And this year is one of those seven years... Belief in the "phantom" island, which, even on the day it is visible can still not be reached, was so strong that it appeared on a number of European maps from the 1300s until the 19th century ☁️ In modern culture the island is said to be inhabited by black rabbits but this was a 17th century addition to the myth and bears no basis in traditional folklore 🐰

‘Sheep on the mountain-side, grazing. Furze on the wind-swept hills, blazing. Sun, ‘midst the white clouds, hazing. Walkers on the viewing point, gazing. A day out exploring Connemara, amazing!’ ‘Lazing’ on my couch, ‘phrasing’ a poem, ‘dismaysing’ the missing #heatwave!

Moonlight filtering through the clouds last night near my home in #Connemara. All was a silvery silence, yet, I could almost hear the waves breaking on the shore behind the pier at #Barna, and I swear I heard the lilting tunes wafting through the branches of the fairy bush.

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Close encounter with a gentle giant off Inis Mór, Co. Galway 🦈🌤️🩵 #BaskingSharks #AranIslands 🎥 ig/divearan

When you're driving down the road and you stumble across a beautiful little beach... 🏖️💙 📸 IG/ nathan_exploress 📍 Ballyconneely, Connemara

A great shop I'd like to highlight is @ByrnesBooks #Galway! Its a bit too far for me to travel to, to take photos and sign my book but huge thanks go to Brian Nolan @GalwayWalks @bgnolan for having these brilliant photos taken of him! 13-20 June 2026: #IndependentBookshopWeek 📚

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Here is the map of data centres in Ireland - over 130 of them. Data centres now consume 22% of Ireland’s electricity

Curiosity @CuriosityonX

a month ago

🚨: Erin Brockovich launches a map tracking AI data centers, and she's asking Americans for help

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A beautiful blizzard of bog-cotton on the bog near Barna, county Galway

It's mid-May and the fairy trees of Ireland are in bloom. Standing alone in fields, stranded on the odd roundabout or just leaning into walls the hedgers were careful not to clip. For centuries no-one touched them (many still won't today). Giving certain trees respect is an Irish habit that turns out to be very old indeed >

Seán Mac Diarmada Executed One of the principal organisers of the 1916 Rising, Seán Mac Diarmada was executed at Kilmainham Gaol on 12 May 1916. “We die that the Irish nation may live.”

I have met them at close of day Coming with vivid faces From counter or desk among grey Eighteenth-century houses. I have passed with a nod of the head Or polite meaningless words, Or have lingered awhile and said... Yeats, WB. Easter, 1916. 🖇️Liam Neeson youtube.com/watch?v=VLt_Ou…

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In Irish, we have an expression "Tír gan teanga, tír gan anam", (A country without a language is a country without a soul). As the vast majority of us grow up without an intimate knowledge of our language, we have some appreciation of what can be lost when a language is lost.

Corncrake, Inishbofin, Co. Galway, yesterday evening, after an afternoon given a talk and leading a birding walk on the Island.

Los Angeles, 1946. Maureen O'Hara stood before an immigration clerk, holding papers that would make her an American citizen. She’d passed every requirement. The exam was finished. The process complete. All that remained was a signature. Then she looked down at the documents spread across the desk. Everywhere she had written “Irish” had been crossed out. Her nationality. Her heritage. Her identity. Gone. In another hand, one chilling word had been inserted instead: “English.” Again and again. Irish erased. English inserted. The woman who fought pirates onscreen and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with John Wayne felt something fierce rise inside her chest. “I’m terribly sorry,” she said, her Dublin accent cutting through the cold air of the Los Angeles immigration court, “but I can’t forswear an allegiance I don’t have. I have no allegiance to England at all—I’m Irish.” The clerk stared back, confused and irritated. This wasn’t how these meetings were supposed to go. Maureen FitzSimons had been born in Ranelagh, Dublin, on August 17, 1920. She came to America as a teenager after Charles Laughton spotted something extraordinary in her screen test. He persuaded her to shorten her surname, offering O’Hara or O’Mara. She chose O’Hara. But she never chose to stop being Irish. By 1946, Hollywood knew her as the fiery Queen of Technicolor. A woman who performed her own stunts and refused to be reduced to decoration. But the American immigration system saw only one thing: a British subject. The reasoning was painfully simple. Ireland had still been tied to the United Kingdom when she was born. Even after the Irish Free State emerged, much of the world—including the United States—continued classifying Irish citizens as British subjects. To Maureen, it wasn’t paperwork. It was erasure. The clerk sent her before an immigration judge, certain he would settle the matter. The judge repeated what the records said. Washington considered her English. Her papers would reflect it. Maureen stood her ground. “I cannot accept American citizenship under those circumstances,” she said. Washington was contacted for confirmation. The answer returned unchanged: English. “Your Honor,” she replied, calm but blazing, “I’m not responsible for your antiquated records in Washington. Thank you very much, but I cannot accept citizenship under those conditions.” She turned toward the door. She would rather leave without citizenship than sign her name beneath a lie. Then she stopped and faced the courtroom one last time. “Do you realize what you’re trying to do to my children and grandchildren?” she asked. “You’re trying to take away their right to boast about their wonderful Irish mother and grandmother.” The judge threw up his hands in defeat. “Give her anything she wants on her papers,” he snapped. Maureen walked out with documents finally marked Irish. And from that day forward, thousands of immigrants would no longer have their identity erased by the word “British.” Because one woman refused to let the world decide who she was.

Seán Mac Diarmada and James Connolly were executed #OTD 12 May 1916. Mac Diarmada spent the days before his execution in the Gaol. The badly wounded Connolly was brought to the prison that morning in an army from a hospital in Dublin Castle.

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In Ireland, the Hooded Crow has long been linked with war, death and even the sorrow of grief ⚔️🐦‍⬛ Still wearing her ragged, grey shawl, the Hooded Crow is believed in parts of Ireland to be the form taken by the Banshee “the woman of the fairy mounds” 🪨🐦‍⬛ The cry of a Hooded Crow circling above a home is believed to foretell a coming loss as the Banshee crosses into the mortal world to mourn the passing of someone from one of Ireland’s great families. However, setting aside the stories of sadness, the Hooded Crow is fantastically intelligent and helps to nurture and clean the landscape by scavenging decaying bodies and dispersing the seeds of plants and trees such as the Oak and Hazel allowing the growth of new forests and the regeneration of the old 🌰🌳

Late afternoon cracks of sunlight at the base of the Cliffs of Moher, Co. Clare, Ireland …bringing all the shapes. #cliffsofmoher #coclare #ireland No sound available while recording slo mo on Nikon z7ii.

Nine eggs were incubated by the parents in the swan nest for almost six weeks. Seven cygnets hatched out three days ago. Another cygnet died after hatching. One egg didn’t hatch. All seven cygnets appear healthy and strong. Isn’t nature fantastic! #swans #cygnets #Galway #Ireland

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On the way to beautiful Ballyconneely... 🦈⛰️💚 📸 IG/ connemara.timeless.captures 📍 Ballyconneely, Connemara #BaskingShark #Ballyconneely #Connemara #Galway #Ireland