If you're traveling along the N22 near Curraglass in Co Kerry you'll come across an annoying dip on the left-hand side of the road. 'Why don't they repair it?' you ask. They did but it reappeared again. €40,000 later.
What could explain such a strange occurence? Danny Healy-Rae has a theory: fairy forts.
The Kerry TD told the Irish Times:
There are numerous fairy forts in that area. I know that they are linked. Anyone that tampered with them back over the years paid a high price and had bad luck.
If you're from the country there is a longstanding tradition that you do not tamper with a bush etc that might well be a fairy fort. This has been part of folklore for hundreds of years and obviously it's something which still holds importance in Healy-Rae's mind. When asked if he believed in fairies he said 'there was something in these places you shouldn’t touch,' before adding:
I have a machine standing in the yard right now. And if someone told me to go out and knock a fairy fort or touch it, I would starve first.
Advertisement
Now obviously our knee-jerk reaction would be to laugh at Healy-Rae once again, for such a preposterous suggestion but I'd say if you took a straw poll of people over the age of 40 in Ireland the vast majority would agree with him that they shouldn't have tampered with the landscape.
Have you ever seen a single bush standing in the middle of a field, for no apparent reason? It's because farmers are afraid to cut them down for fear it's a fairy fort.
However, with regard to the dip in the road at Curraglass, the Kerry County Council had an interesting, perhaps equally plausible theory. They claim it's down to a 'deep underlying subsoil/geotechnical problem.' Sure. Sure.
