Dunmore East Coastal Walk – SOCIAL BRIDGE ~ Jean Tubridy connecting with you from Ireland

Warmth ~ A Preview of Summer

It usually happens around this time of year in Ireland and it happened to me yesterday out on the Cliff Walk in Dunmore East.

There I was listening to the gulls and mesmerised by the pastel shades all around me when I felt a deep glow of heat on my back. I call it the hug of the sun and it reminds me that Summer is on her way.

Once you get this feeling, everything starts to fall into place and yesterday there were signs of Summer all around me.

Joggers in T-shirts and shorts chatting and laughing as they ran like free birds:

The deep blue sea and the sight of Hook Head Lighthouse basking in the sun:

Warm4 — Hook Head Lighthouse, Co. Wexford

And down below me, a colourful fishing boat dancing along towards Dunmore East Harbour:

I’m not saying for one moment that I want Summer to hurry along. Spring has far too much to offer us yet but these little glimpses of Summer are what make ‘pet’ days so magical.

Stolen Moments in Co. Waterford

There are times when you find yourself somewhere that you didn’t expect to be and it feels surreal.

Well, that’s how it was for me the other evening when I found myself with a gang of lads who were bursting to go swimming at Badger’s Cove in Dunmore East here in Co. Waterford.

While they took to the water, I felt drawn up the Coastal Path by the last dance of the setting sun.

Dunmore East Cliffs towards Hook Head Lighthouse, Co. Wexford

Gulls were gliding silently overhead, making their last forays of a long day:

As the sun faded, a soothing haze draped over the Coastal Path and far beneath, the full sea swayed ever so gently.

The Coastal Path, Dunmore East, Co. Waterford

I knew I wouldn’t have time to walk to the end before night drifted in. The most magical moment of all was in the turning round and seeing the blades of grass silhouetted against the painted sky.

Have you found yourself embraced by any magical stolen moments recently?

Sea Pinks or Timelines?

Economics has never been my favourite subject and I can’t say that I have brought much of what I studied of it in College into my everyday life. However, the simple, yet profound, concept of Opportunity Cost has never left me.

Coastal Path, Dunmore East, Co. Waterford

Yesterday, as I walked along the Coastal Path in Dunmore East here in Co. Waterford, I found myself thinking about it yet again:

Opportunity Costs: The loss of other alternatives when one alternative is chosen.

In particular, I got to thinking about the extent to which social media has become such an integral part of life and of the endless hours one can spend on platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and so many more.

I wondered about the percentage of people who will look back on their lives knowing that their end is near and delight in memories of time spent reading their timelines.

No doubt some people may be Facebooking or Tweeting with their last grain of energy but I suspect that Social Media won’t even enter the minds of the vast majority.

Yes, I would much prefer to be out walking along the cliffs in Dunmore East, soaking up the sun, taking time to touch the Sea Pinks, watch the seagulls gliding, gaze across at Hook Head Lighthouse, be enraptured by the layers and layers of colour, scent, texture … than living a life or a half life through social media.

I’d certainly much prefer to depart this earth to a memory of swaying Sea Pinks than of timelines scrolling on and on and …..

Running East

I was awake very early yesterday morning and had one of those pre-dawn walks with puppy Stan before the birds were even chirping.

Just as we were coming home I could see that there was the prospect of a glorious sunrise out at Dunmore East. I haven’t said much before about how Co. Waterford is very much divided into the East and West for all sorts of things, including sport. But I suspect the division may have started with the sun, like so many other traditions.

I knew I just had to get to the Coastal Walk in Dunmore ~ a place that is fast becoming very special to me because of the magnificent vistas it presents and, of course, its view across the Waterford Estuary to the Hook Head Lighthouse in Co. Wexford, the oldest operational lighthouse in the world.

I didn’t meet a soul on my travels; just as well really as I felt like a character in Wuthering Heights and only realised when I got home that I was wearing odd shoes and the raggediest jacket in the place ~ one that served as Stan’s emergency bedding for a while.

Here’s the drama that unfolded before my very eyes out on that glorious Coastal Walk high up on the cliffs.

Bridge of Dreams

New Dawn

Back at Dunmore East Harbour, the boats were swaying as the gulls screeched. And there among the fishing boats was this one:

D10 — Sunrise 11 at Dunmore East, Co. Waterford.

I caught this glimpse of Tramore on my way home, taking a few of the lovely by-roads on the eight mile trip. The tide was almost fully in so the sand dunes were surrounded by water with the Back Strand sky blue and I suspected the gentle waves lapping up on to my beloved beach. I always feel gleeful when I can see the Comeragh Mountains standing tall behind Tramore and think Waterford is a county that has everything I could ever want.

D11 — View of Tramore and Comeragh Mountains, Co. Waterford.