Islands of Ireland: Collan More, County Mayo — created by the last Ice Age's retreating glaciers

The hospitality of islanders is legendary and this was demonstrated to a disoriented kayaker at Collan More recently

Islands of Ireland: 198-acre Collan More Island, in Clew Bay, County Mayo

This lovely island has got to have the strangest shape of all our islands. Most of our islands are generally round or ovoid with inlets and bays, of course. Collan More in the centre of Clew Bay looks like a duck with an extended head which has turned its back on the coast: three peninsulas just westward to the ocean, two of them forming a large bay, while the eastern side is a more or less straight line.

The reason for the dramatic shape is due to the action of the retreating glaciers of the last Ice Age, 12,000 years ago when the islands of the bay were formed. Vast melting glaciers deposited huge banks of alluvial matter which by further action of wind and tide over the millennia left these exotic shapes of some of these islands. The hooked ends of some of the drumlins were caused by a re-glaciation, according to some scientists. The effect is odd and recalls the experimental shapes of surrealist paintings.