Islands of Ireland: On my deserted island... please don't send help

Young's Island in Lough Derg, County Clare has remains of campfires — and is a neighbour of Holy Island which has a round tower and the ruins of six churches

Young's Island, Lough Derg, County Clare. Picture: Dan MacCarthy

Inside some people lurks a desire to escape from it all, to pack that rucksack and head off across the desert or into the mountains or find refuge on a remote island. Perhaps the greatest adventurer and dreamer of them all was the fictitious Huck Finn, the protagonist in the exquisite Huckleberry Finn novel by Mark Twain.

Our coastal islands are largely unwooded and therefore less intriguing perhaps than their lacustrine or riverine counterparts. Wooded islands can give the feeling that there may be someone dwelling within, or some hidden camp, maybe an old cabin of some sort with an anchorite tending their garden.

Some islands lend themselves to this feeling more than others and this is especially true of islands in lakes, and even more true of islands in very big lakes where the sheer volume of island would make it very hard for anyone to find you should you choose to up sticks and move there.

Several of the islands in this series have been ‘settled’ — probably by people for whom society has become too much to handle... and, in deference to their privacy, these islands shall not be named.

Lough Corrib has an island with a long-since abandoned group of caravans from the 1970s. And there are many others out there. Often, a camp can just have the bare necessities: a bivouac slung over a branch of a tree for shelter, a campfire, and a kettle.

The giveaway is the campfire, and Young’s Island in the County Clare part of Lough Derg is one such place that attracts transient visitors to its leafy hideaway. Young’s Island is a neighbour to the historically important monastic site of Holy Island, or Inishcaltra, with its round tower and the ruins of six churches.

Inis Cealtra or Holy Island. An ancient site on Lough Derg often frequented by the great Brian Ború, High King of Ireland.. pic.twitter.com/cacXCBMOAm

— Mark McGuire (@MarkMcGuire_Irl) July 28, 2023

En route to Holy Island from Mountshannon Pier, you first pass Bushy Island and then Young’s Island. It is heavily wooded with native trees and almost impenetrable but by dint of its campfire was once a home for someone for however short a time, and just the type of river island where Huck alighted.

When he escaped from his father, Huck hid out at Jackson’s Island on the Mississippi near the town of Hannibal, Missouri. The island has been identified by its real name of Glasscock Island but it has now been eroded by the river.

“I was away below the ferry now. I rose up and there was Jackson’s Island, about two mile and a half down stream, heavy timbered and standing up out of the middle of the river, big and dark and solid, like a steamboat without any lights,” wrote Twain.

Apart from the oaks, beeches, and holly trees on Young’s Island there is a fine flourish of arum maculatum, otherwise known as cuckoo-pint or 'lords and ladies'. The toxic plant has actually many other names including Adam and Eve, adder's meat, cows and bulls, devils and angels, and snakeshead.

In the context of Huckleberry Finn, lords and ladies is quite appropriate as it conjures up an image from the great paddle steamers of Louisiana of people parading on deck of an evening.

Lough Derg is the third largest lake in Ireland and is part of the Shannon River catchment area. The mighty 360km river flows from its origins at the Shannon Pot in County Clare forming the two huge lake systems of Lough Ree and Lough Derg along the way before entering the sea at Limerick.

The soul of the river was captured a few years ago by Paul Clemens in Shannon Country: A River Journey Through Time which takes its place with some of the great river books of literature such as Amazon by Wade Davies.

Final word to Huck Finn on the thrill of landing on an island with no one there but himself: “The next day I went exploring down through the island. I was boss of it; it all belonged to me, so to say, and I wanted to know all about it.”

How to get there: Kayak from Mountshannon Pier — or light out on a raft. There is a basic pier on the island.

Tours to Holy Island with Ger Madden of holyisland.ie