Island wonders to delight the soul

LATE April in Ireland and the woods are carpeted in bluebells, a sight to behold.

White ransoms have blossomed and their garlicy smell pervades the woodland paths. The flowers of triquetrous garlic, the real wild garlic, bloom like white bluebells on the roadsides. Anno Domini 2009 seems to be a great year for gorse; all over Ireland, it is brilliant and robust and brightens ditches and hills. Its contribution to the landscapes among which we are fortunate enough to live costs us nothing. It requires no cultivation, no more than the bluebells, the garlics, the primroses or violets. Nature is the gardener, no effort on our part is required.

Last week, before leaving Lanzarote, with which we were greatly impressed, we spent two days on La Graciosa, an island to the north. Eight kilometres by four, it is the smallest inhabited island in the Canaries. I would urge my walking, nature-watching and adventurous readers to visit it. In Europe (if the Canary Islands are in Europe, other than politically) it is unique. A 15 minute voyage from Órzola in the north of Lanzarote transports one into its distinctive world.

There are no paved roads. Dust tracks cross the island, joining its two settlements. The village streets are of sand, and many locals and visitors do not bother with shoes. They are six or seven battered jeeps, one of which offers a ‘safari’ trip, while some visitors rent bikes to get around. We walked. The landscape seemed barren but was burgeoning with life. In April, millions of flowers had sprung up out of the desert; there were gorgeous butterflies, fast lizards and elusive birds.

Sometimes, we came upon square metres of ground entirely covered with the dead shells of banded snails from which the sun had long since bleached the colour. They lay in whitened drifts and one wondered how nature had deposited them all together in one place. Did the wind blow them, like snow? Surely the snails didn’t, in their tens of thousands, crawl to these special places to die, like elephants in a secret graveyard? Now and then, we found their living descendants, small colonies of shells decorated with bands of red and yellow. Glued to branches of desert scrub, they were secure against the burning sun and drying wind, evolution fighting desiccation.

Each day, we headed for a distant beach. As we walked, we were alone in the empty landscape. Nearer or further away, perfect volcanic cones rose from the plain, their flanks patterned with strata like enormous primitive artworks. Red, ground-hugging soda-weed grew in rivers of colour down their sides as if buckets of paint had been poured on them. Also called ice-plant or barilla, this spectacular dry-ground species, its leaves covered with crystallised water drops like tiny jewels, was once a valuable crop, harvested to make soda.

The world all around was like scenery from a spaghetti western. “All day I face the barren waste, Without a taste of water, Cool, clear water…” I sang to my wife. I’m not sure she was amused. While I delayed to admire and photograph every wonder that I saw, what she wanted was to reach the beach, immerse herself in the sea and rhapsodise about the flowers afterwards.

The beaches, apart from the one which is, literally, part of the port village, were as wild as if man had never walked them. The sands were white and fine and the sea cool but pleasant. The islands closer to Africa – Lanzarote, Fuerteventura, Graciosa – do not enjoy the warm Gulf Stream as do the southern islands, further out into the Atlantic, La Palma, La Gomera. On my first day back in west Cork, I headed for the cliffs – the tendon I tore in Havana having repaired itself – firstly to walk through the bluebell woods and secondly to see the ravens. There, in the usual guano-white bundle of sticks on the cliff face, sat three glossy fledglings, now as big as their parents and in fine feather. Soon, they will fly. Meanwhile, the parents stood guard in the field above and cawed warnings, curses or imprecations as I eyed their precious chicks.