Ireland day 0673. Wednesday 02 August 2023- Malahide and Samsonite *

Ireland day 0673. Wednesday 02 August 2023- Malahide and Samsonite

Today’s summary	Spent the day mostly in Malahide. Drove to Ballycoolin in the afternoon to get Val’s suitcase repaired. Walked round the demesne in the evening
Today’s weather	Poured with rain all night and most of the morning. A bit drier in the afternoon but no sun. Moderate northerly wind. Appx 16C

Today’s overview location (The green mark shows the location of our route)		Close-up location (The orange 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): Demesne and Tesco

Commentary

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

Much as the activities of the last week have been brilliant, it was actually quite nice today just to potter around in Malahide and not do anything very much.

So I spent the morning sorting out some photos from last week’s wedding and uploading them to a shared drive. Whilst I was busy with that, Val headed over to the playing fields to go for a short run. We both feel with the various recent distractions that we have neglected our fitness and diet, so we took the first steps to improving both today. At the moment I weigh 77.6kg (12st 3lb) and I want to get down to 73.0kg (11st 7lb) by Christmas. Let’s see how I get on. All it takes is a bit of willpower!

After a light lunch, Val decided that her suitcase (a Samsonite) needed a broken hinge fixing so found a suitable repair shop in an industrial estate round the M50 to the north of Dublin. So we drove over and left the case to be sorted out. The man in the shop said that the problem with the hinge was a known fault, so it will be repaired for free. Excellent result!

One of the interesting things we did accidentally find out on our expedition today was that the Trusty Yaris isn’t so trusty if you try and start it without depressing the clutch. Val had been having difficulty with it lately so we decided to “RTFI” and see if we could diagnose the problem. The root cause soon became clear, as I habitually depress the clutch when starting the car and Val doesn’t. If the clutch isn’t pressed, the instruction manual informed us that the immobiliser remains activated so the car is as dead as a dodo. All very good but a bit annoying if you are trying to get away in a hurry. Anyway, we were very pleased seemingly to have resolved the issue.

Once back, I dragged Val out again and we headed off on our usual walk round the demesne. It’s so wet at the moment, I can hardly believe that only a few weeks ago I was writing about how it hadn’t rained for months and how everything was looking desiccated. It’s the absolute opposite now – and indeed Met Éireann have just announced that last month was the wettest July ever recorded in Ireland (while June was the warmest). Strange times, but at least we’re not subject to the horrific heatwaves that much of the rest of the world seems to be suffering – and the vegetation is loving it.

As we were walking round the demesne, engineers were busy putting up the temporary seating for the up-coming matches at the castle Cricket ground. Such a lot of work for such a short season! We were thinking of getting tickets for a one-day international, but at the moment the weather is just too unstable and 12 hours watching nothing happen, as the rain pours down, could be a bit disappointing.

We concluded our walk with a short stop off at Tesco to get some accoutrements to go with the chilli con carne we were having for dinner. And now that we have dined, it’s time finally to relax properly, enjoy a beer, and start catching up on some sleep!

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


In the Rosemount Business Park in Ballycoolin to leave Val’s suitcase for repair	The wild meadow at the Casino museum has been mown and the cuttings need to be collected up for hay. But it’s far too wet and if it doesn’t stop raining soon, it may well just rot

August rose! Up by the Avoca courtyard near the castle	Coming slowly back down to earth

The mild and wet weather means that the plants are flourishing. It’s so green everywhere!	It’s not only the plants that are enjoying the rain. Fungi seem to be making the most of it too

Had to drop in for essentials (i.e. pringles and tortilla chips) on the way back from our walk