There are certain places in the world where mist and fluttering raindrops belong.

NEAR DUBLIN, IRELAND

There are certain places in the world where mist and fluttering raindrops belong.

Places where sunlight seems ill-suited and snowfall just wouldn’t be right. Where the cool touch of skin and stone makes hearths even heartier and turns thick velveteen curtains into folds and cloaks of warmth and security.

The curling stone steps that lead to Malahide Castle, Ireland , are just such a place.

JUST BEYOND DUBLIN

I arrived on the grand lawns and curving pathway as a storm descended over the city of Dublin, only nine miles away.

We ran beneath the ivy-clad doorway, stooping beneath the arch from a time when the world was different, when even the strongest and tallest of men didn’t reach the lofty heights of my one metre and sixty-odd centimetres.

800 YEARS OF IRISH HISTORY

The core part of Malahide castle began life in 1174, with later parts arriving throughout the years. It was, for almost 800 years, the family home of just one family: the Talbots, swept from France via Wales into southern Ireland with the Anglo-Norman invasion and onto these very grounds. (And for any Welshies reading, yes, indeed it was the Talbots of Port Talbot on the southern coast of Wales.)

The family history takes in, as you might expect, key events throughout the ages, from the expulsion by Cromwell’s soldiers to a bloody defeat at the Battle of the Boyne (where fourteen Talbots sat together for breakfast, never to do so again.)

Yet the Talbots, and the castle, survived.

END OF AN ERA

In the twentieth century, the last Baron passed away and the property passed to his sister Rose. Unable to pay the inheritance tax, she sold the castle to the Irish State in 1975.

Malahide, therefore, has an unusual trait in that it’s adapted for the 20th century yet has an ironclad foothold in the past.

Across the road, beyond the willows and those swirling, curling stairs appears an ever more modern phenomenon: a gift shop.

Yet this too carries an historical secret all of its own.

AVOCA: IRISH HISTORY IN DISGUISE

For it turns out that the great silver letters that spell out AVOCA are not, in fact, a result of austerity cuts or shoddily spelled avocado. They’re the brand name for Avoca (pronounced ah-VO-ca,) an Irish business whose history dates back to 1723.

THE OLDEST BUSINESS IN IRELAND?

I’ve heard some claim that it’s the oldest business in Ireland, but with The Brazen Head pub in Dublin notching up a start date of 1198, I’ll allow someone else to battle it out. The oldest handweavers perhaps?

Either way, Malahide offered a glimpse into the Ireland of right now : dripping with centuries of history, yet striding with confidence into the future.

But whatever else happens, one constant remains: there are certain places in this world that are simply built for mist and rain.

Disclosure – While I’ve visited Ireland many times and have Irish blood in my veins, this latest trip to Dublin and out to Malahide Castle came about as a project between iAmbassador and Tourism Ireland. All murmurings about raindrops remain my own, of course.