Visitors start making the pilgrimage to Blasket Centre

IOAND an Bhlascaoid welcomed a good number of visitors when it opened on Monday, getting the summer season got off to a start four months later then usual.

The Ionad gets a subsantial amount of business from coach tours and these are likely to be absent this summer, but on the first day at least the Ionad still had ‘a lot of people in’, according to the centre manager, Lorcan Ó Cinneide.

In advance of the opening, staff have done a huge amount of work to ensure the centre was fully compliant with coronavirus regulations while still maintaining the Blasket island experience.

Social distancing requirements have reduced the capacity of seats in the theatre but Lorcán said the building still has the capacity to cater for a large number of visitors, who have a choice of booking in advance or simply calling in to the centre. The centre is also developing an online booking app, which will be available later in the year.

Meanwhile, the Ionad will have an added attraction later this month when a new walkway and viewing platform, looking across at the Great Blasket, opens to the public. The development was announced in 2018 as a signature project funded by Bórd Fáilte and the OPW and construction of the walkway and platform were part of a €2.25 million investment in the centre.

With construction now almost complete, the walkway and platform will be open to the public open by the end of the month, offering what Lorcán described as “a new public amenity on the Wild Atlantic Way”.

The construction of the viewing platfrom and walkway was greeted with a degree scepticisim when it was first announced but “it will give many more people access”, said Lorcán.

The walkway intersects with the very popular cliff walk ‘Siúlóid na Cille/The Way of St. Gobnait’, part of which has been closed since June 8 due to ‘health and safety considerations’ at the platform construction site.

“Working with Comharchumann Dún Chaoin, we made every effort to reduce the impact of the construction on walkers and only closed part of the walk when absolutley necessary” said Lorcán.

When completed the new path and platform will interesect with Siúlóid na Cille for a 300-metre stretch.

Ionad an Bhlascaoid is open seven days a week, 10am–6pm.

Contractors Pat Ashe & Co. laying the new path to the OPW’s soon to be completed viewing platform at the Blasket Centre.