A visit to Blarney gardens

 Another month is almost gone and it's been a good month.  The virus figures have reduced significantly and people are going out again meeting up in large groups and it's just great getting back to normal.  Today my sister called up and we surprised her by bringing her to see Blarney gardens in Blarney, Co. Cork.  We had all been to the castle in previous years when our American cousins came to visit but haven't been back since.  We never actually walked through the huge 60 acres of sprawling parklands which include gardens, avenues, arboretums and waterway gardens.

We first sat and had tea and cake in the café before beginning our stroll through the colourful pathways. 

It was busy with tourists. They were happy and enjoying their surroundings. It felt great to hear all the foreign accents again after an absence of two years.   

               

              

The photos are only a glimpse of the beauty. The herbaceous border is my favourite. I really didn't want to leave. We didn't get to see everything even though we  stayed until closing time. We will be back!

MAY DAY

Today is the first day of May which is always a lovely month.  Long evenings with sunset this week just before  9 o'clock.  We still need to have the heating on at night but hopefully can reduce the time by half in the next week or two.

We have been going back and forth to west Cork and Kerry in the last month spending lots of time outdoors walking and taking photographs of the beautiful Beara peninsula in South west of Ireland.

One of my photos from east Cork which features the Cathedral in Cobh was selected for the month of May for a calendar.   It wasn't my best shot of the town but nevertheless they seemed to liked it.  I just managed to click at the exact time when a break came in the clouds and the sun burst through for a few seconds before it darkened again. It had been raining for most of that day.

TODAY IS A GOOD DAY!

 We have arrived safely into yet another new year. 2022 started a bit rough for many as the pandemic continues it's relentless spread. It's now in every town and village in this country and throughout the world.  The Covid19 figures reached their highest level earlier this month.  However, with 93% of our population double vaccinated,  the admissions to hospitals are not as high proportionally compared to figures from last year.  The Omicron variant is the dominant one now and so far it's not as severe as previous variants.  Can we dare hope that it will weaken further? There is a tendency for pathogenic viruses to become less lethal with time, as the hosts of more dangerous strains tend to die out. The figures are reducing at an acceptable level this past week.  Just today we received some long awaited good news,  our government announced the lifting of many restrictions. At long last we see a light at the end of the tunnel. In the words of Taoiseach {Prime minister} Mr. Michael Martin , 'Today is a good day'.

The January days are starting to get longer.  It's now bright at five o' clock. We have gained 30 minutes more daylight since 21st December. It's been a mostly grey and dull month with the odd scattering of sunshine but in the last two weeks we have been gifted two full days of clear skies. Mr. D and I like to take a daily walk.  We walk mostly in our local park which is located beside the beautiful river Lee.  If a clear sunny day is forecast,  then we travel further afield.

I've taken photos from our walks on the two best days this month.

Below is the lake at the Inniscarra Damn.  The water level was much lower than usual which enabled me to climb down to the side of the lake where I took this photograph on 16th January.  It is normally submerged.

   Our view as we walked beside the lake.

    Below:    Inchydoney Beach.  20th January, 2022

Mr. D took these 3 photos of Inchydoney beach.  My sister Bernadette and I messed about picking up seashells and practicing our deep breathing while gazing at the waves. It was too cold to eat outside but we did enjoy our lovely picnic lunch while we sat in the car on the hill on the right.  A wonderful day which will stay in my memory forever.

AUTUMN IS EXTENDED!

It's mid November. Mr D. and I are here in Ireland.  We have had a few very nice trips to our holiday home in west Cork.  It's been great to have somewhere to escape to over the summer and autumn but now the days are mostly dull with lots of cloud cover and rain.   However it has been unusually mild and most days, we walk in our local park where there are many beautiful trees by the river Lee. 

Normally by November, we would have had one storm stripping  the leaves from the trees leaving us with a bare landscape.  This year we still have leaves with stunning autumn colour to brighten even the dullest of days. 

 

 The days are really short and it's dark by 4.45pm. The nights are long but I keep myself busy. I've just finished a painting of a sunset at Banna beach in Co. Kerry. 

 I have a few sewing projects to do and I plan on redecorating the spare bedroom if I can find some nice wallpaper for one of the walls.  I am doing some online Spanish classes and can't wait to try out the language when we eventually get to Spain.  I would so love to be in a warm sunny country just now but friends have told me it's a huge hassle travelling in these times.  Covid19 figures are rising again so we haven't been able to book any trips abroad. We will just have to wait.  We are being very careful and thankfully so far we have not caught the virus.  Fingers crossed we will be able to meet up with friends and family at Christmas.

SEARCH FOR A HOLIDAY HOME IN IRELAND

 We have had a lot of time over the past 18 months to think.  The ongoing pandemic and travel restrictions have allowed us to stay in Ireland and get to visit places which we have never been to before but are within a two hour drive from Cork where we have been living since we sold our house in Turkey.  Once we sold up in Turkey our plan was to look around southern Spain with the intention of buying a holiday apartment there.  The availability of flights, choice of airlines and shorter flight times make it a very attractive country for get away breaks for family and friends. I've been learning Spanish on line for the past few years in anticipation of this new chapter. But as the saying goes " The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry" !

Before we left Turkey and since we returned to Ireland I literally spent hours surfing the internet for properties and locations.  I did find a lovely Spanish town which ticked most of the boxes and there were plenty of nice apartments and townhouses which would suit us perfectly.  However,  because of the pandemic we could not travel abroad.  Mr. D suggested we should look at properties here in Ireland.  At first I was very much against this idea.  I felt if we bought a house here then that would put an end to my Spanish dream. Mr. D pointed out that our initial plan was to firstly rent in Spain, find  a location we liked.  Renting would give us the option of seeing new places and we could even spend time in other countries like Italy where we enjoyed great holidays in the past. If in the future we still wanted to buy in Spain then we could sell the Irish property. We would have options.  I eventually agreed this made sense.  So we both started looking online for apartments.  After about six months of searching we agreed on and viewed a very nice three bed apartment close to a long sandy beach in East Cork. We put in an offer and waited.  Another offer came in and we made a final offer just above our budget.  A week later we got news from the estate agent that someone else had made a higher offer and it had been accepted.  I thought to myself, " we will have to wait until Spain" !

A few days later I was lazily browsing sites for West Cork/Kerry properties.  Prices are very high in these areas. Because of the unspoilt beauty it attracts many rich foreign buyers. This is good for the areas because they bring in money from abroad to renovate old properties.  They employ local builders and spend their money locally.  On previous searches of these areas I couldn't find anything within our budget. 

 I was pleasantly surprised when I found two properties which looked good in the few photos and were just at the top of our budget. The nicer of the two properties was going to be sold at auction so I wasn't sure how high the final price would be. 

 It was early December 2020 and we were now allowed to travel within our own county.  These properties were just two miles away from the Kerry border.  This place was right in the middle of unspoilt beauty.  We decided to make a day of it and head west. 

 We were cautiously optimistic.  We had arranged to meet the estate agent in the beautiful town of Castletownbere on the Beara peninsula. Half the peninsula is in Co, Cork and half is in Co. Kerry. I asked him to first show us the apartment which was in the town.  It was a newly built first floor apartment in a block of three.  It would definitely work as a holiday home. We both liked it but didn't get that 'Wow I must have this' feeling.  We said yes we would think about it.  I had a gut feeling about the property we were to see next.   I had checked it on Google maps and it was in a remote village about fifteen minutes drive from the town. It was a dull grey day as we drove at speed trying to keep up with the Estate agent.  The narrow road had twists and turns. We both prayed we wouldn't meet another vehicle speeding in the opposite direction. The unfamiliar road seemed much longer than we had anticipated and Mr. D commented 'This is very remote!'   I replied, 'Let's wait and see'. Suddenly we could see the sea on our left and mountains on our right. This looks good I thought. Are we in Kerry? I asked.

We arrived in a beautiful village with a river and a bridge at the entrance.  We parked the car and followed the agent.  We all wore our masks. The only sound to be heard was the bleating of sheep. He opened the door and we stepped inside the house which was in a neat row of about 12 terraced houses.  Immediately I got a warm feeling. 

The beautiful staircase and natural wooden doors looked like they were just fitted. He pointed out the downstairs bathroom.  He led us into the main reception room which was open-plan leading to a large kitchen.  We both looked around and then at one another. Instantly we both knew we had that 'Wow I must have this' feeling. And we hadn't seen upstairs yet! 

Upstairs was more than we had expected.

There were three double bedrooms.  The main bathroom was a good size and the windows were double glazed. If it looked this good in the middle of winter, then it could only get better in summer.  

 He explained that the house would be going to auction. I asked what would the sellers accept if we were to buy it without it going to auction. He gave us the figure and I felt my heart rate speed up. Within 15 minutes of seeing the house we put in our best offer. It was now up to the sellers.

On the drive back along the peninsula we took our time and admired the stunning scenery.  Would we be lucky enough to get this dream house?  

The estate agent wasted no time in getting back to us the next morning.  The sellers had happily accepted our offer. I pinched myself and was so happy that the East Cork apartment fell through. The scenery there was nothing like the scenery here. We had been to other parts of west Cork and Kerry over the years and have many happy memories but now we were about to have our very own house in a most beautiful magical place.  Maybe for some unknown reason the universe steered us here.  For now we will enjoy all it has to offer. A selection of views from our walks around the peninsula.

I will let the photos speak for themselves.  

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THE BIG DIG

There are some garden jobs which are a bit daunting and therefore get put to the end of my to do list.

One such job was a rather large Euphorbia.  I have had them in my garden for years.  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euphorbia_mellifera

They keep seeding and I pot them up and donate to charity plant sales.

One of these seedings grew in my sunny part of the garden and as it grew it blocked out light from other plants. Being away in Turkey for so many years I noticed a huge difference in it when we moved back to Ireland.

With the improvement in the weather and warm April days I decided to cut it back.  This I did and was left with a huge stump.  I dug away the soil as much as I could but there was no budge in the roots.

Two days later and more digging and still no budge. 

My sister Ber said she would come armed with a crowbar and we would stay at it until it came out.

She arrived next day prepared for work dressed in her gardening clothes and we set to work.  She reminded me to take breaks stretching our backs and doing spinal exercises as we went.

The crowbar was good. It got in under the roots where the spade would not go.