CURIOSITY: SCOTLAND HAS ITS highlands, England the Pennines, Italy the Apennines, and North America the Rockies . . . mountain ranges that split the country, and the drainage, into east and west.
And Ireland? Spineless Ireland has no backbone, just a boggy midland depression and a gutter where the Shannon flows. And, consequently, no watershed. We do, however, have one lake that, uniquely, flows both east and west.
This can't-make-up-its-mind body of water is Westmeath's Lough Lene, near the "wondrous" village of Fore.
Don't know Fore? The small village and its ruined Benedictine abbey claim to have seven wonders. Several are associated with water, including water that does not boil - beware, no good comes to those who try! - and a stream that apparently runs uphill.
They really should add Lough Lene to the list. And not just because of its excellent trout-fishing or blue-flag beach, but because this intriguing lake flows both ways: one outlet drains eastward into the River Deel and thence to the Boyne and the Irish Sea; a second leaves discreetly via an underground channel, and supplies a spring at nearby Fore that drains west to the Inny River and the Shannon and ultimately the Atlantic Ocean.
Lene's unusual behaviour was pieced together over the years by geographers at Trinity College Dublin, led by Dr David Drew, tracing the region's underground streams and caves.
Turns out that this relatively flat area was once a stunning limestone landscape, as impressive as any seen today in China or Vietnam, with great rocky towers and pinnacles, immense chasms and caves, and a subtropical climate.
But that was two million years ago, and time and ice ages have ironed that landscape smooth. Today, there are just some lakes and springs, and a hidden, underground world of streams and caves.
It's what geographers call a "fossil landscape", with a few clues around, such as the many springs and caves. Most of these, like the wonders of Fore, have yet to be fully explored.
You'd have thought that, once scientists started investigating the region, they would soon dispel the myths and mysteries. But if anything, science seems to be adding to Fore's list of wonders.