2023-08-16 09:50:00
REPORTING. The tube launched millions of French people on the roads of the “Lakes”. Even today, the region, located in the west of Ireland, attracts fans of Michel Sardou.
From our special correspondent in Ireland, Nathalie Chahine The Kylemore site is the most visited in Connemara. The Benedictine sisters have owned the castle and the abbey since 1920. © NATHALIE CHAHINE Published on 09/13/2019 at 5:41 p.m. – Modified on 08/16/2023 at 9:50 a.m.
Subscriber-only audio playback
Antoine, Stéphanie and their two children roam the small port of Clifden, braving the drizzle and the ambient 14 degrees. “Why did we choose to come and spend our summer holidays in Connemara? Because of the song, of course. She rocked all my childhood and many late evenings! says Stephanie. In the village, John O’Reilly sees almost all the holidaymakers in the region pass through his Irish music shop. The Sardou tube? It is, of course, in his personal CD collection: “I don’t think any other foreign song has had such an impact on local tourism. The French must be the most numerous European visitors, no doubt for this reason. »
An impression confirmed by the statistics, which place our fellow citizens in 4th place among tourists in Ireland behind the Americans, the British and the Germans, with 564,000 entries in 2018. This number has been increasing by 3% per year for five years. Disturbing fact: while the Americans and the Germans surveyed the whole country, the French went directly to Connemara. Which makes Monica MacLaverty, European director of Irish tourism, say that “the French don’t come to Ireland, they come to Connemara. The song plays a certain role, more or less consciously. And this is likely to last: the recent recovery of the title by Kids United, the group of singers supported by Unesco, maintains the enthusiasm among the younger generations”.
READ ALSOIs Michel Sardou really on the right?
Regional anthem
Connemara, a fantasy region, can also lead to settling there to open guest rooms or a restaurant truck offering pancakes. Lorène Bourgeois, guide and trip advisor at the Killary Adventure Company, made this choice in 2018: “I wanted to work in Ireland after my studies because Connemara attracted me. No doubt I had unconscious expectations. The song is really cult! “During the trip, the tube is a regional anthem – at Kylemore Abbey, the most visited site in Connemara, it is enough to sing the first bars for the French present to start singing. It’s also a must on coach trips, explains guide Fabienne Dhervé, who always has the text of the “Lakes” on her: “During rainy days, when you can’t see the landscape and you have to put a little atmosphere, it works every time. The “scorched earth” and the “stone moors” lead travelers on the trail of the places that inspired Sardou. That he has never visited the region counts for little, as if everyone was looking less for a real country than for a pretty story.
READ ALSO“Les Lacs du Connemara”: the composer of the song responds to Juliette Armanet
What repercussions?
The only truly identifiable place in the song, Ballyconneely attracts its share of pilgrims all year round. The only pub in the village, Keogh’s, broadcasts the “Lacs” as soon as a group of French people pushes the door. Same thing at the Peacockes, a hotel-café-boutique in Maam Cross which masterfully capitalizes on the expectations of visitors. The French can listen to the title of Sardou sitting by the corner of a peat fire while sipping an Irish coffee, before climbing the three floors of a tower which offers a 360 degree view of the surrounding lakes. In the adjoining souvenir shop, they are among the best customers, assures Brid Burke, owner of this place where all the buses stop, very well located on the road linking Galway to Clifden. The same goes for the Killary Harbor fjord, at the café-shop-museum run by Greg Thompson: “Because of Brexit, my French clientele has exceeded that of the English. And for years in my museum, the Sheep and Wool Centre, the history of wool and sheep farming has attracted more French schoolchildren than Irish. “If the lakes are indeed the subject of the song, Sardou does not cite any of them, and the assumptions are going well as to who would have inspired the text, each going there from his little story to feed the fantasies and turn his trade.
As for the real economic benefits, everyone deplores the tendency of the French to “be careful”, to “forget” tips, to choose a youth hostel and all-inclusive holidays by coach. Ireland, a country close to France, accessible by low-cost flight, has the erroneous reputation of being an economic destination. The prices on site, comparable to those practiced in France, lead the French to reduce their expenses – to bring back a mug rather than the famous hand-knitted sweater. Constantly compared to prodigal Americans, the Tricolores however have a more advantageous leave system, which allows them to stay there longer, more often, from Easter to All Saints’ Day. “They settle down and explore the whole area. They go biking, hiking, picnicking. The Americans are flying by,” says Dominic O’Morain, owner of the Lough Inagh Lodge hotel. He was part of a delegation from the Connemara Chamber of Commerce, which went to Paris to thank Michel Sardou for having done so much for the reputation of the region.
In 2011, for the 30th anniversary of the song, a dozen traders and hoteliers made the trip to give the singer the key to Connemara, an honorary distinction which was accompanied by numerous gifts such as a right to pasture for his sheep. in Clifden, roundstone peat and a stay at two well-known hotels in the area. An invitation to which the artist has not yet responded.
#Connemara #French #tourists