Brigid Flaherty, May 13, 2019

Transcript for Podcast and Iveragh Peninsula Slides

Brigid Flaherty: Dia daoibh duaine uisle! Hello and welcome to ‘Something Strange or
Startling’. Brigid Flaherty here in the podcast studio with my friend, Allison Mascolino
Allison Mascolino: “Hi Brigid, thanks for having me”
Brigid: Happy to have you here Allison. Today we will be discussing “Inventing Sustainable
Tourism in the Iveragh Peninsula” and I don't just mean environmentally or looking at the natural
world around us as important as that is and it is a very big concern in Ireland as well but I am
endeavoring to find some of the differences on the challenges that are taking place in the lives of
local people in Ireland as they face mass tourism in these rural areas. Are they retaining their
identity, their culture, is changing is it a show for these locals? And so some of my research,
some of my interviews, as well with people from the Iveragh Peninsula are focused on that. In
Ireland, the Department of Tourism estimates that upwards of eight billion Euro in revenue is
generated from the tourism sector and that's something in the order of 200,000 jobs are
dependent on it. Ireland’s tourism industry has been growing over the last few decades, though
there has not been much research into the effects of tourism on the lives of Ireland’s citizens.
There are of course statistics and reports concerning profit, number of visitors, and amount spent
on gifts, but this does not scratch the level of local likes and the communities in Ireland. This
leaves questions about these people and how their local lives and their communities have
changed because of mass tourism in Ireland.
I spent part of my spring break in Ireland in the Iveragh Peninsula with my cousins,
trying to investigate some differences that they may have seen over the years, changes in
advertising, and challenges they may be facing now including you're looking at limited parking,
being in close proximity to the Gaeltacht and incredibly far removed from most of the main
motorways in Ireland- they are on the very edge of the world. during my time on spring break I
was lucky enough to spend some time with my cousin and my brother in Ballinskelligs down on
the Iveragh Peninsula, which is technically considered a Gaeltacht and I was very interested in
this aspect of the tourism because Gaeltachts are really trying to adapt to this this trend of mass
tourism. For example, Dingle Harbour is currently being dredged so that cruise ships can actually
come in and you're looking at vessels that can double the capacity of the village in one trip. I
spoke to a family there who was concerned you know this wasn't the idea of childhood they had
four other two kids of like school age, and going to and from sporting practice, and home you're
going to have a village really overrun with tourists at a time. And so the Gaeltachts and Iveragh
are looking at this challenge the Gaeltachts/Gaeltachtaí- how do they deal with this? What are
some of the challenges? I found a very interesting article bike Gearoid Denvir and it was
authored in 2002 so so much may have changed since then but he warned about how some
innovations can easily change life in the Gaeltacht. He was studying the Aran Islands and
obviously Inishmore has the most visitors, and the most infrastructure. But looking at the smaller
islands obviously they need access to more resources but it could affect their life. Denvir argues
that making minority language speakers switch to power languages such as French or English
endangers exist in the minority language. Then he also challenged this idea of tradition and
identity. Denvir pointedly asks “Do we put on dance, do we put on music- folk nights or festivals
to entertain the tourists or do we do it to express ourselves to ourselves?” He also asks, “Would it
not be better to seek to retain rather than to be in a position to be obliged to recreate true
authenticity?” In an effort to present some of the feeling of some of the locals regarding and
goggling a tourist on Coach buses Denver includes a poem by Michael David who was part of
the second of the Irish language and so he wrote in Irish- it's translated by Louis de Paor- and it
says “Tá bus ag iarraidh dul soir/Tá bus eile ag iarraidh dul siar.” It’s translated as bus squeezing
East/ bus squeezing West- and it is quite the common sight when you're in the Ring of Kerry,
when you're in Kerry to see these coach busses squeezing east and west. Allison has first-hand
experience on those buses.

Allison: Yep I was in one myself and lots of squeezing east, lots of squeezing west.
Brigid: You were part of a tour group that was already set up with an agenda is that correct?
Allison: That I was. I was on a CIE tour popular tourist -why can't I think of the term popular
tourist company that does a lot of their tours in Ireland they do tours elsewhere but a lot of their
tours are in the Irish Republic.
Brigid: And you went all around the Republic, or most of the south is that right?
Allison: oh yes we started our tour in Limerick city and then we made our way down the coast
around from West to South to East we didn't go super far north in the Republic we didn't visit
Galway or any of those places.
Brigid: You were all on a tour bus were there different nationalities? Was it all Americans?
Allison: It was actually, we were all Americans on the store so that was fun stuff right there and
you were with your family.
Brigid: I do want to ask you specifically about your time in the Ring of Kerry because that is
what the podcast is about today. What did you think of your time there- did it feel rushed? Did
you enjoy it? Was it the prettiest part to you? I know that’s a stereotypical question ‘What did
you think? What’s your favourite part?’ but it is often an important part of tourism.
Allison: From what I remember -this was two summers ago- the Ring of Kerry was probably the
most or one of the most rushed parts of my tour. It was very stop in a small town, stretch, maybe
get a pint or something to eat while we were there. It was no more than 20 minutes and each
place we stopped at so the Ring of Kerry so the only thing I actually remember tour bus kind of
looking at all the greenery and the sheep farms and all that. Yeah there weren't necessarily like
planned stops just places that were very rushed
Brigid: so you stopped in different places along the Ring of Kerry and I believe we discovered
that we have both been to Coom an Chiste (Coomakista) which is where that statue of Mary is in
the mountains.
Allison: that would be correct
Brigid: I was actually there myself with my cousin and my brother over spring break, and we're
driving back from Derrynane to Cahersiveen. We were counting the coach buses and one of them
was actually parked right behind the statue, it looks like they had dropped off tourists somewhere
and they're waiting to pick them back up. How did you find driving around the ring with all the
winding roads on the bus did you face any difficulties that you have to stop for anyone?
Allison: There were instances where a car every now and then would come from the opposite
side of the road and we have to pull over because tour buses are pretty big in the roads in Europe
are pretty small that happened if you time with other two as well I kind of just pulled side let one
go by the other, but stay until the other drove by but yeah we face that a lot in the Ring of Kerry.
Brigid: You said that it was stop stretch maybe if a pint about 20 minutes in each spot. Do you
think that's detrimental or not the best route to take in the tourism industry when you're looking
at these villages in these towns in the remote areas because oftentimes you'll have locals- I've
talked to a few and they say Killarney has it all sewn up. Now they packed lunches they really
just stop and get out and take a few pictures, then get back on the bus. So you're looking at a
population who may want to tap into this tourist industry, this tourist economy, and may even
have some infrastructure like in Cahersiveen they have the old Barracks as their tourist centre
and their community centre as well. But really they only get buses of pre-booked tourists it's
never the massive coach busses that come through usually with some different American tourists
or Germans or Italians. So you're looking at a population while to say they’re missing out would
be disingenuous but they're looking at these buses come through without much interaction which
I suppose might have its pros and cons.
Allison: I would agree with that. I think I can think of one example when I went on the tour. I've
actually had this conversation with you before. My tour bus stopped in the town of Sneem, good
ol’ Sneem. From the way my tour guide was explaining it, Sneem wasn’t a stop that a lot of tour
buses actually stopped at and that kind of thing. But the reason we did stop was a little break and
I get out stretch type thing the guide did recommend we try some local things there. There's an
ice cream shop called Annie’s- 10/10 would recommend. But like other than that we didn't really
get to interact with the local that all that much, but it was one of the more like one of the times
that we actually did get to kind of just be with locals even if it was for a short period of time
Brigid: In ‘The Iveragh Peninsula: a Cultural Atlas of the Ring of Kerry” John Crowley and
John Sheehan, the editors, observe that tourism plays an intense role in some of the parts of the
county especially some of the parts of the peninsula. They say quote, “Clearly the way forward
for tourism in the area will not merely involve expanding the numbers touring the Ring of Kerry,
but rather expanding the amount of time people spend there.” And I know I discussed that with
some locals in Cahersiveen and even the editors in the work points out this may be one of the last
true authentic or traditional towns for the locals by the locals on the Ring. And so I talked to
some of the locals they're my cousins included, a woman working at the History Center at the
Old Barracks there- and it was upheld and renovated by the community for themselves, by
themselves, not simply to draw these tourists in. They really do not get many tourists, I talked to
her and she said that they hardly ever have people stop in from coach buses unless it's a
pre-planned coach that they say we're taking people to Cahersiveen and we will be stopping at
the Old Barracks and they are forewarned. It's never really by surprise. Surprise visitors are the
small cars of foreign tourists who might be renting the vehicles of driving around Ireland
themselves. I asked whether it was a problem or not for her, not to have these coach busses and
she says it would be helpful of course obviously to have that traffic, that that income, but the
main problem probably was Cahersiveen doesn't have a parking lot. They have one parking lot, if
my memory serves me correctly, behind the main street but you have to go down an alley and
kind of turnaround another one to get to it, which would be absolutely impossible for his coach
buses it’d be straight out of a comedy skit or Father Ted to see them try. So you're looking at a
town that’s really just a long one long main street and -despite its 5 different names at different
parts- it is the same long road. You have these buses that are clogging traffic and are just trying
to pull off to the side to let the tourists off but really they're not spending any time there because
now these companies in Killarney they're packing these lunches for the tourists. That way you
get them out into the ring and carry you bring them right back to Killarney, and Killarney really
is it serves as the base hub for a majority of tourism in the area. A lot of the literature published
on tourism in Kerry, in Ireland, it focuses on that. Even when I discussed Killarney as the hub
with Colm Healy, the owner of the Skelligs Chocolate Factory, he acknowledged this.
Colm Healy: First of all, fáilte.
Brigid: Go raibh miath agat.
Colm: So the problem is the nature of a circle- there is no start no end to it and Killarney have
sort of claimed ownership to it. And the mindset in Killarney I’m not advocating whether its
right or wrong- the mindset is keep them here as much as possible have something good in the
evening so that's great but they don't want people spending a night or two away- you want them
on the bus for the evening meal then. So good for them. So it is a struggle for everywhere that’s
smaller and maybe doesn't have the same infrastructure as Killarney to I suppose compete with
them.
Brigid: Do you get any coach buses for the factory?
Colm: No. We don't we don't promote them, we don't want busses. We know our demographic,
so our target is independent travellers and the ideal demographic for us would be two German
couples in a hire car. They have disposable income, they’re discerning. If they like what you
have, they’re not price conscious. They see value for money. If you're on the coach you're piling
off, using the toilets, eating free samples, back on the coach on a budget. It’s a different market
to what we want- we want somebody looking for experience. We can't compete on price so we
don't.
Brigid: Do you think Brexit will have a major impact on the chocolate factory.
Colm: We don't know, like everybody else. I mean they were going to be gone by now just once
every two days while the 12th of April, 13th of April. They were meant to be gone the 27th of
March and now is it going to be sometime between now and 31st of October. So the bigger issue
for us we cut back on our exports for the UK. For a while Sterling was at cheapening devaluing
and my concern was more competing against British products of our shelves. But this is just the
start of the Easter vacation here in Kerry and working downstairs I'm seeing more British people
that I anticipated. But they all have a connection to the area- family our holiday home, so I don't
think they're going to be as affected. It's going to be a large number of people who like
everybody else just doesn't know what's going on. If in doubt, you just don’t travel.
Brigid: So the family connections, would you say that the diaspora is a huge pull for this area?
Colm: Absolutely. It was like everywhere else in Ireland from a rural perspective after the
Famine, a poor area: people had to leave. But what happens is you end up with the grandparents’
house, and there could be three or four kids nobody wants to really get rid of it. It ends up being
done up and then all the siblings come in various times of the year, to come and visit. They see
the old homestead and I think a lot of them there's something nice and having an anchor with
where you're from. So that works well for them. Go raibh míle maith agat. Go abhaile leat anois.
Brigid: Míle buíochas.
Colm: Slán!
Brigid: Slán! I’d like to extend a big thank you to the locals in Iveragh- in Cahersiveen, in
Portmagee, in Ballinskelligs- for all of their help and all the information they were able to give
me: for all the free maps and postcards and bookmarks they gave me in the visiting centre and of
course for all the hospitality as well. The biggest thank you goes to my cousin John Paul Mahony
<“Hello der! Hello!”> who managed to drive my brother and I around all weekend and we
managed not to drive him crazy, so all the best to him and his fiance. That concludes today's
episode of ‘Something Strange or Startling’. We hope you've enjoyed this podcast being here in
the studio with us, so we hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. Go out and explore. Be
sure to find the nooks and crannies in the world that might not get all the attention, and learn
something new everyday.

Bibliography
Crowley, John, and John Sheehan, eds. The Iveragh Peninsula: A Cultural Atlas of the Ring of

Kerry. Cork, Ireland: Cork University Press, 2009.

Denvir, Gearóid. “The Linguistic Implications of Mass Tourism in Gaeltacht Areas.” New

Hibernia Review / Iris Éireannach Nua 6, no. 3 (2002): 23–43.

Healy, Colm. Interview by Brigid Flaherty. Recorded Audio interview on tourism and business.

Ballinskelligs, Co. Kerry, Ireland. April 13 2019.

Lucey, Brian. “Time to Get a Better Measure of Tourism’s Benefits,” August 28, 2017.

Rapuano, Deborah, and Jessica R. Fernandez. “Remembering and Living Irishness: Tourism,

Place and Memory.” International Review of Modern Sociology 36, no. 1 (2010): 1–21.