Ireland day 0515. Saturday 25 February 2023- Clare Hall and Doulagh *

Ireland day 0515. Saturday 25 February 2023- Clare Hall and Doulagh

Today’s summary	Val’s back was better this morning so she decided to go to work. I did my Spanish home work, made a chicken casserole, and walked down to Tesco at Clare Hall to do the shopping. Caught the bus back then we enjoyed the casserole with a beer for dinner
Today’s weather	Dry and bright with sunny intervals. Moderate north-easterly wind. Appx 6C

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

Commentary

(Summary blog only. Last full blog was Day 0368).

Much to everyone’s relief, Val was feeling much better this morning so decided to go into work. Fortunately it went well. My own back now is nearly up to 100% and it doesn’t bother me any more.

So once packed lunches were made and Val was away, I did a bit of shopping in Malahide then put a chicken casserole in the oven for dinner tonight. While that was safely cooking away, I decided to tackle my Spanish homework. It was inordinately complicated – describing flats from a Spanish estate agent’s website – and it took me nearly two hours.

Anyway, as soon as that was done, I decided to walk down to the big Tesco at Clare Hall to pick up a few bits – like the all-in-one bread making mix – that you can’t get from our local shops. It’s a decent enough walk – at least the first half through the demesne is. The second half down the side of the R107 is a bit tedious, but I broke it up by ducking into St Doulagh’s churchyard (of the ancient stone roof fame) and had my packed lunch down by the baptistry.

Once down at Clare Hall and shopping was complete, I caught a timely no 42 back to Malahide and was in the flat just in time to greet Val home from work. So now it’s time to try out the casserole – it does smell quite good I must say – and maybe even treat ourselves to a beer.

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


Going into the demesne – it was full of life today, with lots of young people out on the playing fields practicing hurling (and cricket!)	Simple but one of my favourites

In the demesne woods	The stand-alone octagonal bapitsty, over the holy well. It’s the only standalone baptistry, apparently

The baptistry from the back. There’s a stone seat backed by a high wall here, which makes an excellent sheltered spot for lunch

I can honestly say I’ve never seen one of these before