Article by Darren Beck
Next year’s travel destination is set in stone — Inchcleraun Island, the home of fabled warrior Queen Maeve, deep in the heart of Ireland.
This time, it’s win or bust.
Our first attempt fell apart before we’d even left the house.
The plan had seemed simple enough: hire a motor cruiser on the River Shannon, head south into Lough Ree, and land on 143-acre Inchcleraun Island.
Legend has it Maeve — who partly inspired the character of the same name in the TV series The Boys and is also known as Medb — met her undignified end there, struck down while bathing by a piece of hard cheese fired from a mile away.
There was plenty to see: the Place of Maeve’s Death (Ionad Marbhtha Meidhbhe), Maeve’s Sunny Place (Grianán Meidhbhe), and the ruins of churches once plundered by Viking raiders.
We were novice skippers, it’s true, and the uninhabited island was ringed by rocks with one warning buoy helpfully marked on the chart as “very hard to see.” Still, we thought, we’d get by.
We didn’t.
A sudden bereavement meant attending a funeral in County Galway miles away, ending any hope of reaching the island without flooring it — or whatever the nautical term might be. Maeve: one; us: nil.
Not wanting to admit defeat – well, not wanting to lose the €641.75 we’d already paid out – we pressed on with the five-night voyage as a trial run.
Armed with an online training certificate, my wife Catherine and I caught the coach from Dublin Airport to Carrick-on-Shannon, where our two-berth cruiser awaited.
Reassuringly, it was an old warhorse draped in boat bumpers like bouncy armour. After a crash course in boating (no pun intended) — and still baffled by reversing — we set off on our maiden voyage, hoping we’d make it back to dry land.
We turned north to find our river legs, tracing the border between counties Leitrim and Roscommon. Boating proved easier than expected, though our top speed was about the pace of an angry swan. There were no “dark mutinous Shannon waves” either that week. Sorry, James Joyce — wrong season.
As the sun beat down and temperatures hit the mid-20s°C, a stillness hung over the river not even the rumble of our diesel engine could break. Herds of cows slumbered along the banks, bringing to mind Maeve’s most famous exploit — starting a war with the king of Ulster by demanding his prize brown bull to match the one owned by her husband.
The Táin Bó Cúailnge (The Cattle Raid of Cooley) is an early Irish epic full of supernatural drama. Maeve is at its heart: ruthless, beautiful, promiscuous, sometimes heroine, sometimes villain — always a driving force.
Our only demand that day was for a mooring which we found at the neat and tidy village of Leitrim, where we wrestled with a double hitch knot that had a mind of its own.
As it was Ireland, there were, of course, ruins to see — this time, a stronghold of the O’Rourkes, destroyed in the 16th century. Many centuries too late for our quest, but it would have to do.
The next day we retraced our course back to Carrick, then left the river to hire a car for the funeral. The moving service was crowded and a stark reminder of the old wisdom: seize the day.
We returned to the river with renewed resolve and headed south towards the holy grail of Inchcleraun. We passed through the Jamestown Canal and our first-ever lock. Lesson one: cling to a mooring line as the water level drops — and you may achieve lift-off.
That night we moored at the pretty harbour of Dromod. A German skipper threw me a bow rope: “Can you tie up our boat?” “No problem,” I bluffed. Miraculously, they didn’t float off in the night.
From here, Inchcleraun lay a tantalizing day or so downriver — too far to attempt before our time was up. Mo mhallacht ar an lá!
Vowing to return, we turned again into Lough Bofin towards Carrick. At that moment, a gust of wind blew my favourite cap into the water. Bad luck? Or a middle finger from Maeve?
We made a final pit stop at Drumsna, where we found an unexpected consolation prize: the grave of an actual explorer – Dr. Thomas Heazle Parke who crossed Africa in the 19th century. Some say he was the first Irishman to achieve the feat.
Back home in the UK, we pored over navigation charts, dates, and bank balances to plot our next voyage. Our neighbor was celebrating the birth of his first child — a daughter. Her name? No lie — Maeve. And I do mean no lie.
We definitely have unfinished business on the Shannon.
Medb Factfile
- Status: May have been a real Iron Age queen — or even a goddess
- Retirement: Said to have lived on Inchcleraun (Inis Cloithrinn), named for her sister Clothru
- Death: Slain, according to legend, by her nephew in revenge for his mother’s death
- Burial: Said to have been buried standing upright on a mountain in County Sligo, facing her ancestral foes in Ulster
- Name: Likely from the Old Irish word for mead — meaning “she who intoxicates”
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