Ashford Castle in Cong, County Mayo boasts:

• Fully restored to its historic splendour
• 68 unique guest rooms with spectacular views
• 14 luxurious staterooms and suite
• Regular host to royalty, dignitaries and celebrities
• The Huffington Post’s Top Hotel in the World for 2015

What it doesn’t say:

• Occasional seasoned interlopers may be seen driving upon the walking paths

Yesterday we traveled to Mountbellow Woodland.  Best sign seen on the way:

“Bar-Restaurant-Undertaker-Funeral Home”

What more could you possibly need in one location?

As I noted in a previous blog, few walks in Ireland are marked, either the route itself or the trailhead. So after following the directions from the website to a T, we found ourselves in the parking lot of the Mountbellow Golf Club. No worries, the golfers were friendly folk and more than happy to provide us with directions.

Of course, the golfer’s directions did not include road names, just a “drive until the road bends, stop at an old forge and park your car”.

They did not mention that the old forge was The Old Forge, a tiny museum set up to showcase the Bellow Family, former estate owners. The museum is proudly staffed by Jimmy.

At 62, Jimmy is very proud of his heritage and took us through his small museum explaining all the farm equipment as well as putting it into context.

After a chat with Jimmy, it was time for us to head into the woods. These were deeply mossy, fern covered woods but with trees just decades old. As if I had not seen enough varieties of green, there were even more shades here.

Here I saw trees totally wrapped in moss, two inches thick. And ferns the size of Elephant Ears. I also discovered an odd berry looking wild flower. Extra points for whoever can identify it.

After a short hike it was time for a long lunch at the local spot in Mountbellow town then back to Galway City via a different route. Always a different route.

We decided to go via Cong (because I wanted to meet the King, King Cong. A request made ad nauseum mostly to force Ron to make his thats-so-stupid face. Bwahahah!)

Just before entering the Village there was a turn off for Ashford Castle. We knew nothing about Ashford Castle other than it looked super cool! So we drove the one way road (not un-common for here) onto the property.

Whoa. Serious wealth. Expensive cars. People dressed to the nines. Fahncy shmahncy.

Located on a lake, the castle was built in 1228 by the House of Burke, fought over during the next three centuries and finally purchased by the Guinness family.

This is the real deal people. It actually had a small bridge across a stream leading to the elegant front doors.

But alas, no draw bridge. Silly them.

At the sight of a castle surrounded by 350 acres of paved walking paths winding their way through gardens and fountains, their velvet rope barriers casually dropped next to their posts, forty five years fell from our souls.

“Um, is this a road?” I asked?

“Might as well be”, responded the Ron, now directed by his inner 19 year old. And then  he drove on like he owned the place.

And so we toured the paved walking paths winding through 350 acres of the elegant Ashford Castle. In our tiny Renault.

And yes, we gently nudged several well dressed patrons into the grass.

They must have thought we were making deliveries.

“Hey, is that a clay tennis court?” asked an excited Ron. “Lets go see!”

Down a side path we zoomed, checked out the courts and continued along until we reached the back of the Castle, a number of workmen. And a dead end.

“Jig is up”, I lamented. “Unless you can do a K turn on this beautiful soggy grass without turfing it.”

“No problem”, replied Ron and then executed a textbook K turn without so much as a single clump of turf leaving the lawn.

By now the workmen were speaking into radios and glancing anxiously in our direction. So back to the bridge we headed, a few more middle aged ladies nudged into the grass, past the tennis courts, back over the one lane bridge and off to Cong Village.

Looking back in the rear view mirror we decided we’d been thrown out of better clubs than this.