The end of Nimmo’s Pier is a nice spot in Galway, you can look up the river towards the town and imagine Christopher Columbus sailing in and going to St Nicholas’ church all those centuries ago.
Apparently it is all a good place for birdwatching, particularly gulls. Though I’m a bird watcher and admired the oystercatchers and curlew , I don’t pay particular attention to gulls. But perhaps now is the time to start. I’m by the sea!
The little lectern at the end of the pier reminds me of pulpit a minister might use to preach at the city, but instead of holding sermon notes it holds a bronze plaque dedicated to the poet Louis MacNeice with a poem he wrote on the pier at the start of World War II.
Galway
O the crossbones of Galway
The hollow grey houses,
The rubbish and sewage,
The grass-grown pier,
And the dredger grumbling
All night in the harbour:
The war came down on us here.
Salmon in the Corrib
Gently swaying
And the water combed out
Over the weir
And a hundred swans
Dreaming on the harbour:
The war came down on us here.
The night was gay
with the moon’s music
But Mars was angry
On the hills of Clare
And September dawned
Upon Willows and ruins
The war came down upon us here
canal ways 