Ireland day 1508. Friday 14 November 2025- Claudia

Today’s summary	Storm Claudia dominated the day with severe winds and heavy rain. So we scaled back our plans and just walked over the hill to Portmarnock. But even that was a battle against the gale. Spent most of the rest of the day in the flat catching up on podcasts, reading and admin. Smoked mackerel salad for dinner.
Today’s weather	Showers mixed with heavier rain on and off all day. Gale or storm force easterly wind. Appx 9c.

Today’s overview location (The blue mark shows the location of our route)		Close-up location (The blue line shows where we walked) (Click button below to download GPX of today’s walk as recorded, or see interactive map at bottom with elevations corrected): Claudia

Commentary

Today Claudia paid a visit and my goodness she’s vicious. And in case you’re wondering, Claudia is a named storm that has been bringing flooding and high winds to a wide swathe of west Europe, from the Canary Islands to the north of Scotland. Right now, eastern Ireland seems to be slap bang in the middle of it.

So all those grand plans we had dreamed up for today had to be shelved. We decided instead we would just spend the morning doing admin and other bits and pieces, then have a light lunch and walk down to Howth, with a Dart and bus back.

The first part of this plan worked perfectly. We completed all our morning tasks as we expected, then set off on the walk. It all came unstuck on the way up Seamount Road. The wind started to get really strong and the rain turned into a steady downpour. So we scaled back our plans and thought we would ditch our Howth ambitions and finish the walk early at Sutton instead.

But once we were descending Paddy’s Hill we had to back off from even these more modest ambitions. The wind felt like it had risen to gale or even storm-force and the rain was really lashing down. So we only walked down to Portmarnock, with a view to getting refreshments and walking back along the coast.

Even this proved to be challenging enough. Half of my tea blew out of its cup just in the short distance I carried it from the Spar shop to the shelter down in the beach. Then walking along the coast path back to Malahide was a real ordeal. The easterly wind had turned the sea into a boiling cauldron of foam, and the froth was blowing across the path. And we had to lean almost horizontally into the wind just to stay on our feet.

Anyway we made it ok and eventually struggled into the flat looking and feeling like we had spent the last hour being tossed around in a particularly violent washing machine. It was good to get back into shelter and we were both very grateful that we hadn’t attempted anything more ambitious.

The rest of the afternoon and evening was pretty low key. We read a bit, caught up on some more admin, and listened to podcasts. Then Val made us a delicious smoked mackerel salad – a nod to a healthier lifestyle – for dinner and we followed up with satsumas for dessert. Finally, the rest of the evening was rounded off with a couple of documentaries on Netflix.

We are definitely hoping that Claudia will have worn herself out by tomorrow!

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


This branch plopped out of the sky a fraction of a second before I was going to walk exactly where it hit the ground. Fortunately it missed me, and it wasn’t very heavy. But a useful reminder of why it’s not a good idea to go walking in woodland on a stormy day. Even if the trees do appear to afford protection from the wind.	The wood panelled house at the top of Seamount Road is still for sale. Sadly it’s crumbling almost before our very eyes. Weather like today’s won’t be doing it much good either

Battling Claudia!	*Howth with a windswept Cordyline* in the foreground. Looks a bit like one of those photos you see from the Caribbean in the middle of a hurricane**

High Rock exposed to the full fury of the – relatively rare – easterly gale	An electricity pole had snapped in the gale, alongside Coast Road on the approach to Malahide. It was only kept in place by the wires attached to it. Fortunately the electricity company seems to have arrived fairly promptly to sort it out. I couldn’t help but wonder if the mass of ivy which had been allowed to grow on the pole had contributed to its demise. First by increasing its wind drag, and secondly by trapping moisture and causing the wood to rot

A stormy Irish Sea from the top of the Robswall estate looking out to Lambay. Most of the Ireland-UK ferry crossings for today appear to have been cancelled. Very frustrating for passengers but infinitely preferable to be trapped on dry land rather than being held at sea for hours until it was safe to dock