There is little more enjoyable in spring than walking through a woodland filled with bluebells.

Here, a path leading through the scene deeper into the forest.

Bluebells Hyacinthoides non-scripta carpet hillsides and woodlands in April and May each year in Ireland.

And here on the photography workshop in the Irish countryside saw us photograph in ideal conditions with sidelighting that wasn't too strong, little wind and we moved on to some of the area's rivers afterwards.

Join me in Ireland to photograph scenes like this, bluebells are gone now for the year but Ireland has something of interest to photograph all year round.

May is in my opinion the best month of the year in Ireland with fresh growth on trees and hedgerows, flowers in bloom including bluebells carpeting woodlands and hillsides all over Ireland just like in the image here.

May is also the month of the Bealtaine Festival, celebrating arts and creativity for older people, a program of thousands of events throughout Ireland for older people to engage with arts and crafts through learning and teaching.

This festival takes its name from the ancient Irish festival of Bealtaine, held at the start of May and which marked the start of summer in Ireland.

Running since 1996 it was indeed the first such festival in the world; previous years have seen the likes of Colm Tóibín talking about his novels and other works. 

I've been photographing bluebells for twenty years now, but I only recently realised that I have few posts here on Panoramic Ireland on bluebells.

Here a mixture of architecture and landscape in the Irish countryside as bluebells grow amongst ferns on the woodland floor below the old stone bridge.

No landscape photographer's spring catalogue would be complete without images of bluebells hyacinthoides non-scripta carpeting a woodland floor.

Here on our photography workshop that also dealt with photographing in inclement weather, as we photographed streams and forests so too did we concentrate on the colour in front of us.

While they didn't carpet every square inch of the beech woodland floor, they still looked incredible at the end of May amongst the lush green grass and ferns of the Irish countryside. And that path, encouraging us further into the woods.

During a recent photography workshop in one of my favourite Irish locations for photography I visited a woodland that I knew to contain bluebells.

It was the end of spring, getting into early June and I knew that in most locations south of Dublin bluebells were past their best. But this location, sheltered under a large beech wood canopy on the northern slopes of a mountain, always provides a few extra days of bluebells even if the native Irish species of wildflower is not as extensive here as elsewhere - see my previous post of a covered woodland floor here.

As we walked through the woods the path led us past moss-covered rocks and the last of this year's bluebells - as anticipated still in good condition here at the start of June.

Trees arched over the path forming a natural tunnel; burdened by vigorous leafy growth and buffeted by strong winds year after year they almost touched the ground on the opposite side of the trail that invited us deeper into the forest. What a place to stop for a few moments and a memorable photograph.

Panoramic Ireland create photography workshops throughout Ireland, from bluebell and moss-covered woodland to urban Belfast and Dublin.

For more information contact me here.

Bluebells Hyacinthoides non-scripta are a common sight throughout Ireland in late spring every year, particularly in woodlands.

Here in Sligo the whole woodland floor is carpeted with blue from the native wildflowers, rocks and trees are covered with bright green moss under a canopy of fresh green beech leaves.