Killala: a whisper, a wave, a story still unfolding...

 

The first time I landed in Killala back in 2001, I was looking for a place to call home. I’d pootled for two days along the road that unravels around the edge of County Mayo.

Past Bellmullet I headed east from breathtaking Pulathomas. There was Killala, curled around its harbour like a dog in front of the fire.

Killala is a village that both whispers and sings, where the land runs out and stories take over; a quiet place with a loud history, standing bold against Atlantic winds that will slap you awake, even in August.

I parked and wandered around the harbour at dusk, a man with too many thoughts and no plan. 

The tide was fully out, exposing a seabed carpeted by ropes and ancient creels.

Twilight silhouettes of boats resting on their sides resembled sleeping cattle. 

The light was frankly ridiculous, the sun turning the ocean into a sheet of molten silver.

A heron took off in front of me, wings wide as oars, and I just stood there grinning like a fool. Not because of anything profound, just the pleasure of being somewhere that hasn’t yet been polished to death by progress. Wildlife thrives in North Mayo’s ecosystem. 

It felt like the village itself was breathing out, having a moment to itself before the next shift began. You can feel that in places like Killala. A rhythm, low and old, moving slowly yet more powerful than any town clock.

I fell deeply in love with the unique land and seascapes of North Mayo. It truly has the lot: rolling green pasture and barren ancient bog; drumlins and mountains; flatlands and cliffs; so many white sand beaches, untouched by mass tourism.

 

At Downpatrick Head there are blowholes and the astonishing sea stack, Dun Briste, a sight that never fails to make your jaw drop.

North Mayo is also home to a wealth of megalithic and medieval sites. Stone circles rub shoulders with ogham stones. There are subterranean galleries and ancient abbeys.

On the water’s edge at Rosserk sit the incredible remains of a 15th century friary, where I like to stand on quiet cloudy afternoons, looking at the same vista enjoyed by a Franciscan friar of the middle ages, imagining how they felt standing there.

Before we get too lost in the flora and fauna, I have to say that the people here aren’t too shabby either. Not saying they’re chic, but fine humans? Yes.

Typically from this nation of paradox, the great thing about North Mayo is the worst thing: it’s a tough place to make a living; a region familiar with emigration and poverty.

What survives is an environment with acres of breathing space and a population who are genuinely pleased to see you. Killala doesn’t much care for your notions. It doesn’t perform. It just is.

There’s no hunger to be cute, no winking leprechauns or forced céad míle fáilte. They’ll not change for you, but once they like and trust you, you’ll have friends for life.

What you have here is people whose lives are determined by sea and sky, who fish and farm, fix engines and fence fields. They also create stunning art and crafts, works that echo and resound with the area.

There’s something deeply reassuring about this authenticity, with our modern world blurred by filters and obfuscated by fakery.

North Mayo doesn’t try to be anything apart from the essence of itself. While West Cork panders to the English and Germans, while Kerry turns towns like Killarney into Oirish theme parks for American tourists, North Mayo is what it is: a wonder.

Killala carries its vital and violent past with pride. Best known for the French landings of 1798 and the ensuing rebellion.

  

The round tower stands tall and stubborn, a twelfth-century monastic marvel reaching into into the sky, keeping watch over the village. Beside it, St. Patrick’s cathedral leans into its own stories, echoing with the ghosts of bishops and blasphemers, depending on your perspective.

Killala won’t rush you, and it won’t apologise either. If you stop long enough you’ll feel the gentle defiance; the soft, steady roar of a place that knows exactly what it is.

Maybe, if you’re lucky, you might carry a bit of it home with you. Not in photos or fridge magnets, but in the way you start to notice the sound of your boots on wet gravel, or how the sea smells different depending on wind direction.

That’s what Killala does. It seeps into your bones, quietly, like the tide returning.

Long after you’ve left, you’ll still hear its name in your head, soft and strong.

Killala: a whisper, a wave, a story still unfolding.

©Charlie Adley
15.08.2022

My Wardrobes are up on DoneMyHeadIn.ie

The phone rings: “I’m calling about the wardrobes for sale. Are they gone yet?”

“No.”

“Well y’see, I don’t want to come all the way to Killala to find they’re gone. Will you call me and tell me when they’re gone?”

“No probs. So when might suit you to come and have a look?”

“No, just call me when they’re gone. Bye now.”

But but but why did you bloody call me, if you don’t want to see the wardrobes?

In England, buying is simple: you point at the thing, hand over the cash, job done. Nobody cares about you, you don’t care about them. Efficient yet joyless.

Here in the West of Ireland, commerce is not a transaction - it’s a performance; a conversation; a confession; occasionally even a test of your very soul.

I walk into a shop to buy a hammer and emerge an hour later, having acquired not just the hammer but also a potted history of the owner’s great-uncle’s roof repairs during the hurricane of ’87, a rundown of local funeral arrangements, and an unsolicited recommendation for the best chipper “this side of Tuam.”

After moving to Connemara in 1994, I went to buy turf from a man down the road.

After knocking on the door, he appears, hands deep in pockets.

“How’s it goin’?” he says.

“Great, thanks,” I reply, and then, way too quickly: “I’m after a trailer-load of turf.”

He doesn’t answer.

He looks out across his yard, as if considering the broader fate of humanity.

Then: “You will have a cup of tea.”

My London brain says: ‘Tea? I’m here for fuel, not chitty chat.’

But my west of Ireland survival mind kicks in:‘Sit down. Drink the tea. This is the deal.’

Two mugs later, we’ve discussed the weather as an intricate, almost sacred topic involving historical rainfall comparisons and predictions, grass temperatures and cows.

Finally, he nods towards the shed.

“Right, sure, we’ll see about that turf then.”

It’s not the money that seals the deal.
It’s the tea.
The chat.
The time spent.

My introduction to this obfuscated style of Irish business came in the form of the Galway Advertiser Accommodation Sheet.

Every Tuesday at midday the youth of Galway would queue up outside the Advertiser office, to be given an A3 sheet with all the rooms and houses available to rent in that week’s Classified Ads section.

Then we’d dash to a phone box and pump coins in, as we called place after place.

Glaringly absent from both the adverts and conversations was the the single most important detail: what would the place cost to rent?

I couldn’t fathom for the life of me why these landlords potentially wasted everyone’s time by refusing to reveal the price of the place? I had much to learn.

Part of my education came 19 years later. Trying to outwit the indigenous do-si-do rental dance, I placed an advert in the paper saying I was looking for a place to rent outside Galway City.

A bloke calls offering what sounds like the perfect home.
“So when can I come to look at the house?” I ask.

His breathing strangles into a whine.
“Weeeell now, I’m not sure, now, really.”

“How would Sunday be?” I offer, trying to move things along a little.

“Sunday? No, sorry, y’see Sunday would be a bad day for me. Saturday would be better.”

“Great, so Saturday, I’ll come look at the house. What’s a good time for you on Saturday?”

“Weeeell there’s the tenants moving out now, on Saturday d’ye see, so things could be a bit messy, and -”

“Okay, yes, I see, sure, that’s probably not the best time to look at a house.”

“So, right, now, grand so, come on Saturday at 1 o’clock.”

“Oh, okay, I er yeh, great. I’ll call you Saturday morning. Oh, and just so we don’t go wasting each others’ time, did you have any idea about what you might be asking for rent?”

As I ask my voice trails off, because I know he’s pure old school. He doesn’t want to talk money at this stage.

“Ah well now d’ya see I oh I haven’t really oh -”

“Sound. Perfect. Why don’t we chat about that when we meet each other, eh? That’d be better, wouldn’t it?”

He sounds ridiculously relieved at my suggestion.

“Yes, that’s the way. Grand. Lovely. So call me during the week and we’ll sort out a day for you to come look at the house.”

“But I thought I was coming Saturday at 1?”

“Ah, so we did. So call me Saturday morning and we’ll sort a time. Bye now.”

This fella’s called me because he wants me to rent his house, but he will tell me neither when I can look at his house nor how much the rent will be.

This feels more like tickling a trout than finding a home.

So I call Fishy on the Saturday morning, to confirm that I’m about to drive out to the house.

“Well, I’m up in Mayo today,” he tells me, “So tomorrow would be best.”

“But you told me last time we talked that Sunday was bad for you. I thought we’d set up a meet for today.”

“No no, not today, d’ye see. I’m in Mayo. Why don’t you call me next week? Tuesday I’ll be here and -”

I’ve had enough now.

“No. I’ll leave it, thanks all the same.”

A bollox is just a bollox in any language.

Selling is another kettle of fish. I once tried to sell a lawnmower to a man from Moycullen. He turns up, circles the machine as if stalking prey, stands over it for ten minutes in silence, and then he compliments it with faint suspicion.

“Ah, she’s not a bad looking yoke. Does she cut the grass?”

“No,” I reply, deadpan. “She makes tea.”

He doesn’t laugh. Just squints at me like I’d passed some kind of arcane test.

Haggling is not merely concerned with saving money. It’s about the dance. To say ‘Yes!’ too quickly is to spoil the fun. To say ‘No!’ too firmly is to appear prickly. The game is to reach a point where both sides can agree, not on the number, but on the feeling of fairness.

Finally, he asks: “Would ya take twenty less?”
We settle on a price neither of us will remember a week later.

I’ve learned that these dances are not inefficiencies: they’re social glue. Buying and selling here is never merely about the object changing hands. It’s about the slow weaving of trust, the acknowledgement that we’re all in the same wind-battered boat.

You can’t cut the chat or skip the tea without damaging more than the deal - you risk fraying the fabric of the place.

In a landscape where an Atlantic storm can lock you in for days, the Irish have created a culture where every exchange is an opportunity to reinforce connection.

So now, when I walk into a shop, I leave my watch at home. I listen, I nod, I tell my own stories, even if they’re half as good as theirs. I’m not just buying a hammer, or selling a mower. I’m joining the dance.

And if I’m lucky, the tea’s too bad either.



©Charlie Adley
14.08.2025