Ireland day 0217. Tuesday 03 May 2022- Circuit
Today’s summary | Dealt with yet more tax matters in the morning then took the train into Dublin after a quick lunch and walked briskly round the whole outer perimeter of Phoenix Park. Lovely and mild for once, a very enjoyable day out | ||||
Today’s weather | Overcast but dry all day. No wind. Feeling much warmer than recently. Appx 16C | ||||
Today’s overview location (The blue mark shows the location of our route) |
Close-up location (The green 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): Phoenix Park complete circuit |
Commentary
When I looked at the weather forecast today, I could hardly believe my eyes. It said that the temperature would reach the giddy heights of 16C – which I think would make it the warmest it’s been in Ireland since we arrived here seven months ago. Also no wind and no rain was forecast, so it seemed like altogether far too nice a day to spend indoors.
But first, we spent the morning doing precisely that – focusing on some more tax matters. I realise that doing your own tax is tedious enough without having to listen to someone else droning on about theirs as well, so I won’t say any more except that I was glad we had managed to get one small chunk of it out of the way.
Thankfully, the weather was still holding up well when we had finished with all that, so we had a quick snack for lunch then made a spur of the minute decision to go back into Dublin and try and finish off the Phoenix Park loop. We had tried it a couple of times before but had had to abandon earlier attempts midway when we ran out of time. Today, though, felt different. We had a clear purpose in mind, the weather was nice, and we resolved not to be distracted by cafés and other pleasures of the flesh along the way.
As before, we took the train into Connolly then the Luas to Heuston, and entered Phoenix park by the main gate on Conyngham Rd. We went clockwise, as before, first past the Wellington Testimonial and then the Magazine fort, spotting a large herd of deer in the distance as we walked. As you might have expected, after the wet weekend and the warm weather today, everything was springing into leaf and the whole park was a shimmering sea of green. Very soon, all traces of winter will have vanished and we can look forward to an all-too-brief few months of summer again.
I can’t speak highly enough of Phoenix Park. Even though we’ve been there a few times before, it’s always lovely and we seem to find something new each time we visit. This time, we went further west than we have ever done before, to reach the outer boundary near the Mount Sackville school and Farmleigh House. It’s very bucolic out there, and, looks like something from a Gainsborough painting. We peered in at Farmleigh House and decided that we needed to add it to our list of places to visit. It was built by one of the members of the Guinness family and as it’s managed by the OPW, it will probably be excellent. You can see part of it as you cross the toll bridge on the M50 motorway.
We only stopped once – to have a second lunch on one of the many park benches along the way. So we completed the 13 km walk relatively quickly, but without breaking into a sweat about it. It was a thoroughly enjoyable outing, made all the more so by the good weather (it’s amazing how much more relaxed you feel when you don’t have to wear a down jacket all the time) and the burgeoning spring foliage. In fact, if I had to choose one word to sum up today, I think it would be “green”. Ireland in a nutshell, really.
Today’s photos (click to enlarge)
Interactive map
(Elevations corrected at GPS Visualizer: Assign DEM elevation data to coordinates )
Max elevation: 67 m
Min elevation: 2 m
Total climbing: 279 m
Total descent: -278 m
Total time: 03:24:19