Hold Your Horses

A short, spectacular day, most of it on horseback. We saddled up near Sligo in the early afternoon and rode out along the lanes,

then over beaches and bogs and, at one genuinely alarming point, a stretch that felt like an actual road. There is nothing quite like cresting a hill and galloping down the far side of it onto open sand with the sea right there.

It was also about two hours long and deeply cold, and by the end I could no longer feel my feet, but I regret none of it.

That night we checked into Castle Markree, which is exactly the kind of place you cannot believe they simply let you stay in. You climb up through halls and archways and two flights of stairs, past chandeliers and mounted animal heads, and when you finally reach the room there is champagne on ice and strawberries waiting, because Elizabeth plans ahead. For one night, they told us, the castle was ours.

Tomorrow we go a long way north.