Ireland day 0809. Saturday 16 December 2023- Weekend! *

Ireland day 0809. Saturday 16 December 2023- Weekend!

Today’s summary	Val was double-shifting again and I had a day off. After a slightly disrupted morning, she went to work and I cleaned the windows then walked down to Portmarnock and back up the beach. Really appreciating the weekends now that I am working!
Today’s weather	Dry sunny and bright most of the day. Clouded over in the evening. Brisk westerly wind. Appx 11c

Today’s overview location (The grey mark shows the location of my route)		Close-up location (The orange 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): Weekend walk to Portmarnock with sunset

Commentary

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

The good thing about working is that it really makes you appreciate the weekends. I’m not a morning person, as readers will know, so we both had a lie in until 9am this morning when Val had to get up to go to work, and I had to get ready for a Skype call to a friend in Lancaster at 9:30.

Val’s start at the Casino was, however, delayed this morning as there had been a traffic accident in the road outside which had brought down an electricity pylon and cut off the power supply to the museum. In retrospect I think we were both disturbed by noise outside our flat in the middle of the night last night, but we just put it down to rail engineering works, which are a more or less permanent feature of the night times now. It now looks like it might actually have been something altogether more unusual.

So Val had an enforced morning off which gave us the opportunity to have an early lunch together, and to share some of the domestic cleaning chores. The low winter sun was streaming through our south facing balcony windows and was showing up every atom of dirt. So I had a go at cleaning them but despite numerous reapplications of Windolene, I really only succeeded in smearing the dirt around in a slightly different distribution.

Eventually the power came back on at the museum so Val headed off and I decided to stretch my legs and try out a decent long walk. Today I elected to head through the eastern edge of the demesne, up Seamount to Paddy’s Hill, then down to Portmanock and back via the Velvet Strand and the coast. It’s a good 15km hike and joins up the demesne, the hill and the strand – three of my favourite places in our area.

I really enjoyed the walk and part way round I stopped to get a cup of tea at the Spar shop by the beach. I enjoyed the tea and a packet of crisps down by the bathing shelter, watching the sun set and turning the southern horizon orange.

I was back in Malahide by 5pm, and dropped in to Tesco to pick a few essentials (i.e. beers) and then came back to the flat. It’s been a thoroughly excellent day, and my goodness I have really enjoyed not being at work!

(Oh, and by the way – in case anyone was wondering, I seem to be recovering well from my hernia repair eight days ago. The wounds are apparently healing quickly and although I have some pretty impressive bruising which I think will take a few weeks to shift, I’m not suffering any real discomfort. Not quite up to 100% yet, but hoping to be so pretty soon).

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


If you look carefully, you will just be able to spot the Brent Geese, which have returned from northern Canada and appear to have taken up residence on the cricket pitch	Absolutely huge number of holly berries just by the cricket pitch. Should presage a cold winter, but I’d be willing to bet it doesn’t

Hydrangea still in flower. A testament to the mild weather	Lisa not moaning because she’s got a glass of wine in her hand!

Arriving at the Velvet Strand through the dunes, with Lambay in the background	The wooden tube-like structure in the hotel car park is a sauna. They are springing up all along Ireland’s east coast and are apparently very popular. It’s a bit disconcerting seeing groups of semi-naked people wandering across the road out of the heat, heading purposefully for the sea to cool down. Very eccentric

*On Lithostrotion* beach. The sun was setting which is why I appear bright orange in this light. I don’t normally look like this.**