Fergus Finlay: Four decades since my first visit, I still have lots to discover here in Connemara

Due to the character of its people, this beautiful Irish jewel is a different, better place than when I first came to visit

The islands are joined by a string of little bridges, where you have to pull in and let the car coming against you pass. It’s part of the necessary slowing down which is an essential element of a week’s holiday in the West. File picture

I remember still the first time I came to Connemara, although it’s more than 40 years ago. It was a sad experience, and I remember thinking it wouldn’t bother me if I never came back. The weather didn’t help back then — never stopped raining for the week we were there.

But apart from that, there was a sullenness about the place. The local people, I thought, were resentful, with more than a touch of victim complex about them. If you were from what they saw as prosperous Dublin (although Dublin was anything but in the 1970s and 1980s) you were made to feel like an unwelcome interloper.