Conamara pushes the boat out to welcome Ukrainians

Two hotels in South Conamara will open their doors to Ukrainian refugees in the coming weeks – this as the number of Galwegians opening their homes to those fleeing the war surpassed 1,000 this week.

The Carna Bay Hotel and Óstan Cheathrú Rua have both answered a call by Government to open up hotel rooms to some of the thousands of Ukrainians fleeing atrocities in their homeland due to the ongoing Russian invasion.

Hotels are planned to be used as a short-term solution to the growing numbers arriving into Ireland, until more suitable and long-term solutions can be found.

Mary Rogers, owner of the Carna Bay Hotel, told the Connacht Tribune that opening up the hotel would be some small way they could assist with the response to the humanitarian crisis across Europe.

“We’re all watching what’s happening on television and want to help out in whatever way we can. It’s our off-peak season and the hotel isn’t very busy, so it’s a very human response to use that opportunity to help these people.

“We still don’t know how many will arrive here but all 25 bedrooms will be given up and the number will depend on ratios of male to female and the sizes of the families that arrive,” said Ms Rogers, whose grandfather was the great Bobby Beggs, a man with the rare distinction of winning All-Ireland football medals with two counties – his native Dublin and adopted Galway.

A call had gone out to all hotels across the country, through the Irish Hotels Federation and Fáilte Ireland, to help with the crisis, she said, and they were happy to do so, she continued.

Works had been carried out in recent days to ready the hotel, and any bookings that had been made by visitors for the next three months had been cancelled – something Ms Rogers said was a tough decision but “the right thing to do”.

Read the full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune, on sale in shops now – or you can download the digital edition from www.connachttribune.ie