FOR many years now, since as far back as my twenties, I have celebrated the summer solstice by attending one of our many ancestral sites dotted all over Ireland. I do this to honour and celebrate the passion of my father (RIP).

I remember a good friend of mine, Michael Quirke, a wood carver based in Sligo city centre, telling me how Father’s Day is celebrated around the time of the solstice. He told me how our ancestors looked upon the Sun as being masculine and the Moon as being feminine. He also explained to me that the Daghda would have been the Big Daddy of the Irish mythological gods. Michael described to me how the solstice would have been celebrated at the birthplace of Daghda, Newgrange, or Brú na Bóinne as I prefer to call it.

I would highly recommend you visit Brú na Bóinne, located just outside Drogheda majestically overlooking the River Bóinne, or Boyne as it’s known today. You will be amazed by its beauty and its architecture. It’s older than the Pyramids of Giza and Stonehenge and it fills you with a sense of awe as you follow the local guide into the inner chamber along a narrow passage way with the stone walls on either side inscribed with images older than we can imagine.

If you're travelling to Sligo this year for your holidays, or simply passing through, do take time to drop into Michael’s shop in Winetavern Street, opposite the beautiful Lyons café, where WB Yeats sat and penned some of his poetry.

I take time to remember my dad and all the dads who are no longer with us and on their journey Into the Mystic, as the maestro Van the Man would say. For me, this really is a time of no guru, no master, no teacher – just you and I and Mother Nature.

Michael Quirke’s shop was previously his father's butcher’s shop and to this day he cuts his wood with his fathers bandsaw. Michael is a force to be reckoned with, a true Seanchaí of our time and a wood carver of Celtic mythical and legendary figures from all over Ireland.

This year I was unable to visit Brú na Bóinne to celebrate Father’s Day so I went to the next best venue, our very own Giant's Ring, which sits beside the Lagan under the watchful gaze of Cave Hill in the distance. It's home to a wonderful dolmen of three standing stones and a capstone nesting in a natural amphitheatre.

I’m always filled with a sense of wonder as I walk towards the dolmen on the early solstice morning as I’m sure many thousands of my ancestors did before me. You can be inspired as the Sun rises in the east and I’m personally filled with a deep sense of belonging and connection to both time and place. With the rising of the Sun the dawn chorus can be heard –  a new day song and a hymn to the silence.

I take time to remember my dad and all the dads who are no longer with us and on their journey Into the Mystic, as the maestro Van the Man would say. For me, this really is a time of no guru, no master, no teacher – just you and I and Mother Nature.

This year I was – as we all were – blessed with beautiful weather and was able to wind my way home along the Lagan towpath on my bike.