Maam Cross

My trip to Ireland in 1994 was a dream come true. I had thought about it so many years. I had a list of places I "had" to see. Connemara was on that list.

In my desire to see as much of Ireland as possible in two and a half weeks, I did not have advance reservations. I drove as far as I wanted, took as many side trips and stopped at as many spots that caught my eye as I wanted. When I was ready to stop for the night, I looked for a B&B sign. I never had any trouble finding a bed for the night. The only time I did not stay at the first B&B I stopped at was in Oughterard. I did not like the "feel" of the first B&B so went on to another.

That turned out to be a lucky move. The next morning at breakfast I overheard some other tourists talking about going to a horse sale at Maam Cross. It was a rainy morning; not the best for walking around outside as I had planned. Plus, stopping at a horse sale would give me a taste of everyday modern Ireland.

On the way to Maam Cross I saw the bridge where one of the scenes from the 1952 John Wayne/Maureen O'Hara movie "The Quiet Man" was filmed. I also had my picture (top) taken in the doorway of the 'typical' Irish cottage that had been constructed for the movie.

When I arrived at the horse auction in Maam Cross I walked around looking at all the horses for sale. I saw the people from the B&B and talked with them. They had purchased Connemara ponies in the past and shipped them to the United States where they raised them to sell. Apparently my being seen with them marked me as a possible buyer because I soon had the man on the left in the bottom picture trying to sell me the yearling colt he had brought to the sale.

The biggest problem against him convincing me his horse was the best for me to buy, other than the fact that I wasn't there to buy a horse, was my inability to understand him. County Galway is one of the largest Gaeltacht (Irish speaking) areas in Ireland. The gentleman was speaking English but with such a heavy Irish accent I had to keep asking him to repeat himself. I did finally make out that his horse wasn't yet gelded and that if he did not get it sold that day for the price he wanted, he would have to take it home and incur the additional expense of the gelding. I finally convinced him that I wasn't there to buy; just to look.

That doesn't mean I didn't find a horse I would like to have bought. I had read a book about a Connemara mare sometime during my impressionable years and ever since had dreamed of owning one. The middle picture is of the Connemara Mare I picked out that day at the Maam Cross horse sale. She and the colt at her side sold for 650 pounds - about $975 at that time.

I figured it would cost much more than that to have the mare and her colt shipped to Iowa or another of my Irish dreams might have come true.