112. Tidy Towns

I stayed two nights in the most charming town in Ireland, Kinsale of County Cork. It’s a former Gold Medal Winner in Ireland’s national competition for the most beautiful and welcoming towns. The annual contest is called Tidy Towns. A creative stroke of genius, it motivates villages, towns, hamlets across the Republic of Ireland to be the most colorful, the cleanest places on earth. This motivates people to paint their houses, paint every door a different color, have hanging baskets of flowers . . . and of course be as tidy as possible. 

It also gives recognition to rural areas. Big cities like Dublin, called “The Big Smoke” since the industrial revolution, need not apply. Urban density can’t compete with rural and coastal charm. “Kinsale” means the Sea Head. It’s a southern port that has seen history come and go. The Spanish Armada docked here and with an alliance of Irish chieftains attempted to defeat the British Crown. Everything was in their favor. But they still lost. Ireland has never been the same since. The Lusitania was sunk by German U-boats off its coast in WWI.

If you live in the city of Cork, this is your weekend get-away. It’s a Mecca for those caught in the urban hustle and bustle. And its residents are fierce competitors in the Tidy Town competition. Every year all participating towns get a report card on what they did right and what they failed to do. One year, a village missed being chosen as The Tidy Town winner by one point. Why? There was a messy pile of sand in front of one of the houses. Everyone there knew whose house it was. It’s like losing the World Series by letting a ground ball go between your legs. Ouch! A painful legacy!

What does a Tidy town look like. See for yourself.