Ireland's Dingle Peninsula: How Fetching

We lingered at the cliffs of Dunmore Head, overlooking Coumeenoole Strand, where the 1970 epic "Ryan's Daughter" -- a poignant World War I love story starring Sarah Miles and Trevor Howard and acclaimed for its cinematography -- was filmed and where winds that felt as if they were blowing in excess of 50 mph pummeled us as the surf rumbled ashore with mesmerizing force.

We lingered at Clogher Strand, where we saw a seal bobbing in the cove and an island known as "the Sleeping Giant" reclining in the distance.

We lingered at the Gallarus Oratory, a small stone church erected sometime between the 6th and 12th centuries, where we marveled at its construction and its shape. It was built using dry-stone corbeling, a method that involves no cement or mortar but results in airtight and watertight walls. The minute oratory resembles a boat (keel up), perhaps because that shape would have been familiar to the seafaring people who no doubt built it. And you don't have to be religious to sense that you're standing on sacred ground.

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Sacred, too, particularly in Irish literary circles, are the Blasket Islands.

A collection of stony dots perched just off the western edge of the peninsula and accessible by ferry only in summer, the Blaskets are tiny. The largest (by far) of the five named islands is just 3 1/2 miles long and two-thirds of a mile wide. Their population during World War I was roughly 200. But steadily, residents left the islands, many for America, and by 1953 the population was zero.

Yet, from 1929 to 1936, Blasket writers managed to produce three classic works of Irish-language literature: "The Islandman," by Tomas O'Crohan; "Peig," by Peig Sayers; and "Twenty Years A-Growing," by Maurice O'Sullivan.

The historical, linguistic, architectural and natural elements of the Slea Head Drive, and how intrinsic they all are to this mountainous finger of land, became clear to me at the Blasket Center. Walking out of the museum devoted to the legacy of the abandoned islands, I realized this: While many Americans with surnames similar to mine (O'Brian) visit Ireland to get a firsthand sense of their roots, I was getting a firsthand sense of the roots of Ireland itself.

In fact, the western half of the Dingle Peninsula is a "gaeltacht," a region of Ireland where the majority of residents speak Gaelic (a.k.a. Irish) as their first language. In Dingle and the handful of other federally recognized gaeltachts, there seems to be a resurgent linguistic pride similar to that of the French-speaking Quebecois in Canada.

So much so that, even though about 95 percent of Irelanders nationwide speak English, the republic's constitution designates Irish as the national language; a 2003 law requires all government documents and services to be provided in Irish; a controversial 2005 federal decree mandates that the government list place names only in Irish on signs in the gaeltachts; the number of Irish-language-only schools is on the rise nationwide; and the European Union last year recognized Irish as an official language.

As a practical matter, though, while you stay on the left side of the narrow road as you negotiate the tight twists and turns of the Slea Head Drive in your rental car, the only Irish phrases you'll need to know are "go mall" and "tog go bog." The former, which is painted on the pavement, means "go slow." The latter, which appears on road signs, means "slow down" or, more literally, "take it softly."

Take it softly. Linger. Inhale the sea breeze. Bask in the heritage. And, if the opportunity arises, enjoy a game of fetch with a playful canine.

Bill O'Brian, a senior editor for The Washington Post Magazine, last wrote for Travel about the Mark Twain museum in Hannibal, Mo.