Following in footsteps

I've just returned from a trip to County Waterford, my first visit to that part of Ireland. The visit was partly work related, inspired by the links between Lismore Castle and Chatsworth. It was also inspired by my family history. My dad died before I made the connection between these two places. I remembered a photo of him and his twin brother, posing with shotguns. They can't be more than 13 years old, which would date the photo to around 1939. There's a family in the photo with him who were described as Irish friends or relations from Cappoquin. The unusual place name stuck in my memory, and at some point I made the connection with Lismore and Cappoquin. They are about 3 miles apart. So I've joked that I'm probably not the only member of my family to have worked for the Dukes of Devonshire. My great grandmother, Brigid O'Neill was born in Cappoquin, and moved to Manchester to marry John Noone. Her daughter Cecilia was my paternal grandmother. Sadly she died when I was one, so I only know her through photos. I took photographs of my father and grandmother on the trip, not in expectation of finding long lost family members, but so they could share the journey with me. I wasn't prepared for the beauty of the countryside around the Blackwater River, with the Knockmealdown Mountains in the distance. Lismore Castle itself has a special place in Irish history and was redesigned by Pugin in the nineteenth century. The gardens are open to the public and there's a Yew Walk which is said to be where Edmund Spenser wrote The Faerie Queen. Not only that, but William Makepeace Thackery (Vanity Fair) lived in the town. L.P.Hartley ( The Go Between) visited the Castle. To top these literary connections, I discovered that one of my favourite travel writers, Dervla Murphy, is still a resident. I was thrilled to be able to buy a signed replacement copy of Tibetan Foothold from the Heritage Centre. This book had inspired me to visit Dharamsala, home of the Dalai Lama, and I left my original copy there with the granddaughter of one of the Sikh bodyguard who had protected the Dalai Lama when he first arrived in India. A final strange coincidence was the discovery that Joseph Paxton had built a convent there for the Presentation Order of nuns, the same nuns who taught me at boarding school in Matlock. It was a whirlwind of a trip, but I definitely want to return and explore further.