In the lounge of Eldon's Hotel, Roundstone, it seemed as if several lifetimes had passed since my first time there - the inaugural Roundstone Open Arts Week back in 1997. At the same time, without wanting to sound too much like The Carpenters, it felt like only yesterday.

I listened and watched intently, absorbing as much information as possible, as Gordon D'Arcy spoke about the rich, diverse plant and animal life of Connemara. For an hour or so it successfully deadened the embarrassment of living among people who recently elected an ex-Eurovision Song Contest Winner as a political representative in Europe.

Words and images of razorbills, Manx shearwaters, and grey seals were unaffected by news from the outside world; news that offered no specific hints that we were halfway through the last ever year to begin with '19.' Police and new-age travellers squaring up at Stonehenge, mega-successful pop star announcing he's gay, and Northern Ireland limbering up for yet another marathon bout of that peculiar belligerence known as 'the marching season.' Unsavoury reports from other more distant locations melded together to pad out a soundtrack as uninspiring as it was predictable. Apart from the worrying increase in the numbers of Manchester United fans that inexorably followed the team's (admittedly impressive) achievement, it could have been any year out of the last twenty-five. All of Ireland – especially here in Galway - is in the grip of another annual sporting frenzy, and look at you as if you are the possessed one when you tell them you have no interest in Gaelic football or hurling.

Then there are the other joys of summer's zenith. Daylight's presence still graces us 'til almost 11pm, yet pessimists bemoan how the days are 'on the turn.' It can take up to two hours to get to Galway City; an exhilarating, exhausting journey, battling with double-decker buses that seem to get wider each year, and whose drivers display a worrying disregard for the white line in the middle of the road. That dramatic increase in journey time is something to bear in mind if you fancy any of the happenings at the imminent Galway Arts Festival, which keeps on getting bigger and better all the time. There's a massive drum carnival in the middle of July, and, if my memory serves me well, that's where I came in twelve months ago, somehow managing to draw a tenuous link between The Kodo drummers and St. Mac Dara's Day.

Back in Roundstone, meanwhile, among ten days of walks, talks, readings, sessions, and exhibitions, the Baskethouse transported itself from the jam-packed, smoke-filled Thursday madness of Mullarkey's to the much more urbane rural setting of the gardens at Errisbeg House for 'Roundstock', otherwise affectionately known as 'a rock in the garden.' If you successfully block out the fact that there was hardly anybody there on Friday night or early Saturday, and concentrate on Saturday night's vibe, it was a stormer, and you really should have been there to share in welcoming some decent live music to Connemara. Who knows, perhaps it could be the beginning of a beautiful relationship. Roll on 'Roundstock 2: The Rematch.'

You'll be fighting over the tickets. (6/7)

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