Emerald brown…

By the time we got to Ireland the Emerald Isle was brown, along with every acre of parched countryside we flew over. In fact, everywhere in England’s green and pleasant land was brown, just like the outback in drought. Cattle had no good grass to eat, sheep too – even in the deepest shaded valleys. And by the time we left England to fly to Dublin, most crops were ripe enough to harvest, albeit reduced in size, at least a month earlier than normal, and at the time of writing we have not experienced any rain since we arrived. Dams are drying up with ever-soaring temperatures of over thirty degrees. Authorities have imposed water restrictions, hosepipe bans, and warnings about heatstroke. The only green is now, where we are in the Lake District, in the shady valleys of the tarns and fells, and around the edge of the many beautiful lakes.

However, our travels have taken us to fabulous gardens blooming beautifully with sweet-smelling roses and lavender. Every town and village in England and Ireland appear to be in competition with each other to win the Town in Bloom, or Village in Bloom, flower baskets hanging from every conceivable place imaginable.

We stayed with our friend, Catherine, in her cottage in an isolated small Irish village, population four hundred, with two pubs (one for weekends, one for weekdays), a shop-cum-Post Office, two churches – one Catholic one Protestant, an historic ruined abbey, and fairies everywhere. Yes, fairies! In the boles of trees, in the hedgerows, and all round the village. Folklore, or fantasy, the notion appealed, and the arts centre attracted much interest. How the fairy population came about I never really fathomed, but it was a quaint and unexpected pleasure. So, too, were our visits to the pub every night, because this village is just like one big family. Everyone cares about everyone else, and help is always at hand whatever the problem. The farmer may not come around when he says he will to cut the grass of our friend’s field, but he will, eventually – and hardly charge a cent!

We went to all the places you’ve heard of. Galway was full of tourists – mostly American – with fiddlers busking in streets playing catchy Irish tunes you just want to dance to. We went to the Famine Museum, of all places, to get the real picture of what happened. The Great Hunger was a period of mass starvation, disease, and diaspora in Ireland between 1845 and 1849, that resulted in deaths and mass emigration of millions of Irish citizens. What a miserable place it must have been to live in at that time. And then in Dublin’s fair city, after visiting the Book of Kells and staying in the famous Trinity College, under the watchful eyes of Oliver Goldsmith’s and Edmund Burke’s statues, we walked around the Kilmainham Jail looking for clues as to how and why Peter’s great-great-great-great grandmother was transported to Australia in 1810, on board the convict ship Providence. Mind-blowing facts were scrolled on a screen telling what the so-called prisoners were transported for. The most common crime being for stealing a loaf of bread. I noted one in particular being convicted and transported for receiving a loaf of stolen bread. Any excuse, it seemed, to get rid of them and populate Australia. I must say that Catherine Long/Murphy made good her life in Australia after her incarceration, and escaped, albeit forcibly, before the famine could end her life.

So, fired with enthusiasm, we ventured into one of the reasons we had come to Ireland, with our friends from England, Bob and Brenda, with whom we’d joined up in Dublin. All going to stay in the Wicklow mountains for three nights, our sight was set on Powerscourt House, a very fine country estate, believed to be where Catherine Long worked before being banished to the Antipodes. Still beautiful, yet very commercial, with exquisite gardens that put many a stately home in England to shame, we explored the house feeling a connection of sorts. Now owned by the Slazenger family of tennis racquet fame, Peter mused that perhaps his g-g-g-g grandmother had been impregnated by the lord of the manor, borne a child, and had been sent away so as not to bring disgrace to the family. In which case Peter joked, he might be the rightful heir to this stunning piece of Ireland!

All too short, as everywhere we’ve been, we had to return to England for the grandchildren’s school prize giving and end of the school year. Prize giving is the main event in the school calendar, and is conducted in the fine surroundings of Maldon’s Anglican church. Presided over by the head teacher – our daughter-in-law, Elaine – the morning was well-attended and children from each and every form were chosen by a panel made up of teachers, for achievements in subjects as diverse as mathematics and swimming. Parchment scrolls, silver trophies and shields with merit medals on ribbons all lined up, the children came forth proudly to receive theirs, during the two or so hours it took including speeches, singing and a confident thank-you-to-all from three of the younger pupils. I have to say proudly, our two did walk off with some, carefully selected without headteacher mum’s input, of course.

So, just one more day trip to Kent to meet up with our friends and co-boat owners, in Noosa, Lee and Shelley, who are over for at least a year, and another Sunday pub lunch in a garden, we prepared for our final week’s get-away. This time to the wonderful Lake District National Park.

Now, I never have become used to the sheer traffic volumes and speed on motorways that can actually get you from one extreme of Great Britain to the other in a matter of hours. I persuaded Peter that we take our time, stop over one or two nights en route, and enjoy our National Trust membership by visiting their homes and gardens. In doing so, we discovered a myriad of interesting and exciting places that we’d never been to before. Picnicking by the side of a quietly flowing river dotted with sports fishermen sitting on the banks, off a lonely country lane, we sat on the grass luxuriating in the tranquillity of it all, as a single skylark hovered, flapping and twittering over the wheat field next to us. Wine and ham sandwiches consumed, I strained to get up – leg still not up to too much stress – I decided I’d kneel to ease to standing position. Wrong move!

I had been feeling rather smug with myself at being able to climb stairs one after the other, as is normal, and the more I did it, the better I became, feeling more confident as time went by. One short kneel swiftly put paid to all that hard work. Consequently, I am now back to one at a time, on painkillers and waiting for said knee to settle down and reduce in swelling.

It hasn’t stopped us from enjoying the company of our family – we travelled to be here in the lakes at the same time, and we’ve watched as the grandsons cycle and climb and walk their legs off – because that’s what you do here in the great outdoors. Social stereotypes wear convertible Rohan zip-offs, sturdy hiking or climbing boots with woolly socks, layers of sweat-swatching t-shirts and tops, lightweight rain jackets, walking poles and backpacks with bottles of water hanging off, whilst the occasional neckerchief completes the look. This time round, a wide-brimmed sunhat is the essential accessory to ward off thirty-degrees plus of UV rays.

Our son drove the three-hundred-odd miles or so from rural Essex, with his VW camper van (even though they’re staying in a cottage) with four bikes hanging off the back, and stacked to the gunwales with everything under the sun needed for the great outdoors, while he’s loaned us his BMW.

The silence at our cottage is deafening, save for the church clock that chimes every hour, and church bells on a Sunday morning. We looked in on the congregation – the church was packed. Mist settled into the valley one morning, quietly cossetting white stone cottages, trees, rocky outcrops and bracken – soon to be burned off from the clear blue above. Sheep roam freely everywhere – grazing on what grass they can find forcing homeowners to securely fence off their precious gardens. Thankfully, they seemed to have learned about roads and traffic.

Yesterday we took the grandsons on a boat journey on Lake Windermere. First stop was a a National Trust house – a modern-ish ‘castle’ on the edge of the lake. The castle has been equipped and set out for the long August school holidays, as a children’s adventure and discovery centre. They played in the huge room with huge (soft) building blocks and built their very own castle, then to the craft room where they designed their own coat of arms on a shield, and moved outdoors onto the lawn to play surgeon with a pull-apart plastic torso, an actor doctor, and competitions to see which team could reassemble the torso with all the correctly placed parts, that were floating in a large plastic box of red-coloured water. Harry didn’t fancy playing with hearts, livers and kidneys, and excused himself from the fake gore.

Waiting for the last leg of the boat ride back, we were treated to a very special and personal event. Unbeknown to us, David had been in touch with one of his old RAF colleagues who’s an instructor at RAF Linton-on-Ouse, and asked him to do a fly-past over the lake at a time he knew we’d be there (purely for training purposes, of course!). Then, suddenly, at a low (-ish) altitude (for training purposes, you understand!) we were being buzzed as the pilot flew right down the length of Lake Windermere and over our jetty. We thought, wow! Then we got a call from David asking if we’d enjoyed the fly-past…

Last evening, we sat by the banks of a clear cool river as it’s meagre water trickled and meandered down from the hills through rockpools, with Champagne sundowners and nibbles. David took Harry and Max into the deepest pool and dunked them in the very cold water. They all came up gasping but laughing! Sadly, it will all come to an end tomorrow. Our return flights home have now been booked, and David has to fly to the USA on Saturday, leaving the family to re-group back home and for us to pack and sort and plan the fine detail of our return after three months away.

We’ve had an amazing time, notwithstanding the extreme weather, but we’re leaving as thunder clouds gather, hailstorms, flash flooding and travel mayhem begin at the start of the long summer school holidays. The rain is needed badly, but more than can fall in a few days, and it looks like it will all be over again and back to sunshine in a day or two. In the meantime, we hear it’s forty degrees-plus in Dubai where we’re stopping over en route back home. Peter hopes they’ve tipped ice into their swimming pools…

It will be a teary goodbye on Monday, and promises all round, as our latest last hurrah! will come to an abrupt and untimely end. Noosa, here we come…