Yes, a land fit for tourists, and for us. It will be a tough proposition for our Bord Failte to work out a strategy for the industry that will not also, at the same time, put our own noses out of joint. Yet the grumbles of visitors may often bring home to us things we ought to do something about for our own sakes. Such as the rubbish we leave around.
Not so long ago, a German traveller expressed in a newspaper article his disgust at the mess we have made of the road from Ballyconneely to Roundstone, Co Galway. Bungalow after bungalow along the sea road. So much so that he advised his readers to stick to the mountains - unspoiled, he thought. All right if you are a mountain, rambler. Most of us aren't. Would it not be better planning, if people still want to be on the coast, that the houses should be ranged in small settlements, in groups, rather than just strung out along the road? Planning controls strictly enforced.
But if Irish people don't want this, so what? Much of our advertising aimed at Germany is of "Europe's green holiday island", stressing the wild sea coast and cliffs of the west. Ultima Thule stuff, or Hy Brasil if you like. Not that Dublin is neglected. There is much about musical and other pubs, the youth of the population, of the free and easy talk. Of Georgian splendour. And, twice in one week recently, a caller to the west side of Fitzwilliam Square found buses parked, while everyone, it seemed, got out to film the marvellous front doors. "Now you stand in front of it." Germans in one case, two busloads; the second day there were three buses. It probably goes on all day in summer.
And it's not just in Ireland they seek open spaces, lonely sea scapes and mountain slopes. There was a long piece in one Hamburg newspaper about the Faroe Islands, where people "enjoy life with Nature". And then there was "sweat, blood and blisters" in Norway. (The German for that winsome bird, the puffin, is parrot diver - Papageientaucher.)
How many of our visitors are backpackers, not so lucrative for tourism; but in ten years or more they may be back looking for luxury hotels. But, whatever of Dublin's charms, the wild beauty of the west Europe's edge must draw many from cities in Europe, though France and Germany have their own beauties. It's a matter of wanting change, on your vacation.
An excruciatingly difficult task to work out the ins and outs, the pluses and minuses in this industry of tourism, which, we are told will soon be our biggest.