Tag Archives: summer in Ireland

84. Surprising emotions

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Arriving into Sanlúcar de Guadiana last night, I was surprised at just how happy I felt to be home. Just a simple feeling of contentment at being back in my own home.

Our seventy-five days in the UK and Ireland were delightful from start to end. I haven’t enjoyed myself so much or for so long on previous holidays. England was a joy and I experienced very strong positive emotions when I was in Ireland, whereas in the past my feelings have often been mixed. Not because Ireland isn’t great and not because my family and friends aren’t great. It was just me and where I was in my life on previous visits home that made me enjoy being in Ireland on holiday but also eager to return to where I had come from. I didn’t feel that way this time. I enjoyed my time there, and had very mixed feelings about leaving, feeling more torn between the two places I call home than I’ve ever felt before.

So, what a surprise to feel the way I did about turning the key in the lock and walking through my front door last night. Like an exhalation…I’m home. My house is looking a bit the worse for wear after lying empty for seventy-five days and it’ll take us a few days to sweep away the cobwebs, get unpacked and feel properly settled in, but that simple uncomplicated sense of being home was there from the moment I opened the door.

Our lovely friends had been in and left some food in the fridge and our neighbour had hung a fresh homemade loaf of bread on the front door. Still, I needed to buy a few odds and ends this morning, so, after breakfast I threw on something not very presentable that I pulled out of my suitcase and went to the two shops in the village. Ten minutes of shopping took me about three quarters of an hour, from all the people I met, the welcome back hugs and kisses I received, the conversations I had comparing Spanish and Irish weather. I felt welcomed home by my adopted village.

And then, the icing on the cake – collecting Lady from her summer villa (with a swimming pool, no less) and taking her home. Now that our scruffy, dusty, hair in her eyes Lady is back, my little home is complete.

Who cares that our two kayaks are still taking up most of the living room and the suitcases are on our bedroom floors? Time enough moving them tomorrow.

80. Skyscape

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The morning started out sunny and warm. We’d planned to spend the day on the beach but, as usual, we slept in too late and spent half the morning in our pyjamas, drinking tea and chatting around the kitchen table. By the time we were ready to go out, close to lunchtime, it had begun to cloud over.

For our tardiness we were rewarded with this incredible skyscape, the dark grey clouds reaching out across the sea, the rain falling in a sheet a mile or more out to sea. I thought it was coming towards us, that we’d get soaked even as we set the picnic out on a towel on the beach. The rain shower moved from west to east, appearing to approach, but instead moving away to the southeast over Galley Head.

By the time we’d finished our picnic, the sky had cleared and we were warmed by the sun. The sea was inviting but, in the few minutes it took to change into our swimsuits, another bank of clouds had rolled in, another shower of rain fell to the south and we were chilled by the wind as we braved seawater that was the coldest we’d experienced this year.

But as quickly as those clouds came, they went again, and again we were in the sun. And so it was for the afternoon, the mood of the sky changing by the minute, tempting and teasing us, and delighting us with its constantly evolving shapes and colours.

77. West Cork scenes

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The last couple of days in west Cork have been a delight. Here are a few photos….

View from Glandore
Adam and Eve islands
The Warren, Roscarbery
The Warren from the cliff walk
Evening swimmers
Silliness on the beach

75. A summer dress

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I remember I was eight or nine years old. Daddy had dropped Mammy, my little sister and me to the train station, to get the train down to Cork. We were coming here. I was wearing a new summer dress. It was so pretty – a pastel flower pattern. It was my first time to wear it. I’d been saving it for a special occasion and this was it. As we waited for the train, I squatted down and sat on my hunkers on the platform. Not realising that the hem was caught under the heels of my sandals, I stood up again as the train approached. I heard the fabric tear. I was horrified. My gorgeous dress ripped across the back, along the hem. I felt so sad. Something had been done that couldn’t be undone. I wished I could turn the clock back just a few seconds. The next week, my dress was mended, but the line where it had ripped and been restitched remained, visible if you knew what to look for. To an onlooker, it might have seemed like a trifling thing. But I never forgot that dress and that instant when I ripped it.

74. Like summer holidays past

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The rain fell sideways as we packed the car this morning. Mammy had moved the car to as close to the door as she could get it. Still, we swopped bags of food and our mini suitcases for water and leaves trailed into the house underfoot.

It was a tight squeeze, five of us and all our stuff filling up the boot and obscuring the rear window. I remember rainy Saturday mornings just like this, in the early 1980s, Daddy hoisting the suitcase, the wind break, the deck chairs, onto the roof rack of the Ford Escort, covering the lot with the blue tarpaulin from an old tent, securing it with rope.

I had the playlist ready for today’s drive to Cork – 80s hits, of course, that we sang along to in between bursts of conversation.

The rain continued – sporadic heavy showers – and wind buffeted the car sideways. We pulled in to the Rock of Cashel for lunch – ham sandwiches made from yesterday’s boiled ham and Brennan’s bread washed down with sweet black tea from a flask. We stood around the picnic table in the rain, the hoods of our raincoats up, as a sudden heavy shower chased away the slash of blue sky that had briefly appeared. I couldn’t have been happier. Few things in the world taste as great as ham sandwiches and tea from a flask on a wet day, memory and nostalgia adding magical flavour to the food.

We reached our destination late afternoon and quickly unpacked the car. My sister started to make dinner and realized she was two ingredients short. Lily and I walked the couple of hundred metres up to the shop in the village square. On the walk back, we were blown down the hill by the strong wind, rain hitting us on the back. ‘This is perfect,’ I said to Lily. A seaside holiday in Ireland isn’t complete unless you get at least one wild night like this.’ The wind, the rain, the slight bite in the air, took me back 30, 40, 45 years, to family vacations here in west Cork, in Kerry, in Wexford, in Mayo.

Tomorrow we plan to go to the beach – in our raincoats, most likely.

67. Supplies

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Vicks vaporub? Check

Vicks inhaler? Check

Paracetamol? Check

Balsam tissues? Check

Water? Check

Extra pillow to minimise coughing? Check

Well, I’ve caught something or other. Bad summer cold, Covid, who knows. So, I have my supplies lined up by the bed. Here’s hoping I sleep better tonight than last night.

61. Playful weather

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The last time I came home to Ireland for an extended summer visit – 2023 – it rained every day but two of the almost four weeks we were here. Not always heavily and not always prolonged. But every day but two it rained at least for some part of the day.

I wouldn’t really have minded. We live in a hot, dry country after all, and coming home to Ireland’s more temperate climate doesn’t really bother us. We’re here for family and friends, really. So what if there’s some rain? We just don our rain coats and sturdy shoes and get on with it.

Except that I came home for those four weeks in the summer of 2023 on a mission. I’d planned it in advance, discussed it with Mammy and with my sister. I was here to work. The wrought iron gates and garden furniture needed to be painted and the two sheds needed to be cleared out. On my first day or two home, I went to the hardware shop in Edenderry and bought the paint, brushes, rubber gloves and whatever else I needed. I was going to spend much of those four weeks out of doors, getting these much needed jobs done.

But it rained and rained. Day after day. What could I do? If the painting didn’t get done now, the gates and furniture would be facing into another winter of damage. So, I painted in the gaps in the rain, glancing worryingly at the sky and willing the rain to hold off for a few hours to let the paint dry. It rarely did. The painting got done, but the gates still carry the pock marks of raindrops on not quite dry paint.

The garden furniture was easier. We could haul it into the shed to paint it. But first the shed had to be cleared. I did that over two rainy days – clearing the contents of the shed, loading them into the boot and back of Mammy’s car to take them to the recycling centre, then back home to fill up another load. There were decades worth of old stuff to be thrown out – old paint cans, old rusty tools, old broken bits and bobs from the house and the garden. All hauled away in the rain. And then I tidied up what was left and now had space to paint the garden furniture.

Two days without rain that whole summer in Ireland. And it was cold too. We had to light the fire in July to keep warm.

I arrived in Ireland this year with no plans to do any outdoor work around the house. Well, you can guess what’s happened. Glorious weather most of the time, barely a cloud in the sky. The odd day or rain here and there. We’re dining al fresco for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I could be out painting the gates, or cutting back the hedges, or weeding the patio. Instead, I’m sitting inside at the kitchen table, a warm breeze wafting through the French doors, the light too bright for me to work outside on my laptop.

Maybe if I want a break in this glorious summer weather, I should plan to do a bit of painting.

56. The Guillamine

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It’s a beautiful evening, warm and sunny, and the plan is to go for a swim at The Guillamine out in Tramore. Niamh and her family regularly drive the few miles from their house in Waterford city out to this cove where the swimming is good and, towards high water, you can jump from a high concrete platform into the sea.

There are a lot of people there when we arrive. Far more than I was expecting. Men and women of all ages, with a steady stream of people going down the narrow concrete steps from the car park and back up again.

When we get down to the swimming area, the sea is turquoise and there must be 50 or more people in the water. Niamh’s husband and son go straight to the diving platform.

That’s not for me. Without my glasses, I’m quite lost. I can’t really see where I am and, because I’ve never been here before and there are so many people here and it’s noisy with people splashing into the water, I suddenly feel overwhelmed and scared. I hold into a railing, with people asking if it’s ok to go past me. I let them pass. Niamh is in now, and Lily, and I momentarily think I should just turn back and wait for them up by our towels.

Lily swims back to me and tries to convince me to get in. But I don’t like this. Not one little bit. And why am I here? And this is not for me. Niamh swims over and suggests I enter the water via a hand rail. But I’ve already tried that and I couldn’t do it. She convinces me to try again.

It’s my eyesight. That’s the thing. Because I can’t see anything clearly beyond the end of my nose, I am figuratively, if not yet literally, out of my depth. I follow Niamh’s instructions, and now, in an instant, I am in and swimming away from the shore, away from the gentle waves breaking against the rocks, away from the hoards of people lining up to enter and exit the water.

And it’s glorious. The water is cold, but not too cold. Clumps of bladder wrack float past, dark green and slimy. The saltiness of the sea buoys me up with little effort. How could I ever have thought I didn’t want to be in here? I feel alive alive alive. I think I want to come back tomorrow.