An Ill wind that blows.- A loss or misfortune usually benefits someone. For example, They lost everything when that old shed burned down, but they got rid of a lot of junk as well—it’s an ill wind. Dictionary.com
Seagulls at Skerries Pier
Today the wind was blowing from the east and oh boy was it cold! My eldest daughter was up early and walked around The Head with her friends. She came back a shade of purple saying how the wind had got into her bones. As they say here ‘the wind would cut you in two’. The phrase “it’s an ill wind that blows” came to mind. I could go into the origin of the expression; John Heywood’s book of proverbs in 1546 or Shakespeare’s reference to it in Henry VI, but that would be a bit spoofy since I only looked it up. But I liked the Dictionary.com version above all because of the reference to sheds and junk. You see, sheds and junk is a topic that occupies my mind a lot at the moment, as we are clearing out and moving house again. There has been an ill wind blowing in our direction of late. I wonder who the beneficiaries are…..!
However, today I decided not to go into our shed (the barn) and try and sort out the junk. It was my birthday you see and besides I had much better offers. The breakfast on the harbour from Olive with Michael and my (purple) daughter for example. (Ok, so it was in the car because of Covid- but it was good all the same). And the message from Jane, (my sister-in law), saying I should go for a celebratory swim for the day that was in it – the North Strand, freezing temperature……. well, I figured it would be rude not to. “Of course I’ll go for a swim”.
In all honesty never in my life would I have imagined myself swimming in the Irish sea…. on the 11th February… with a group of swimmers around me singing Happy Birthday! Not something I will easily forget. It was just great. The sea is the easy bit. It’s the numb, aching fingers and toes that linger on for an hour or so after. But I’ve read that cold water swimming augurs well in terms of staving off Alzheimer’s, so I figure it could be a good investment.
It was a birthday punctuated by coffee- Olive coffee, Goat in the Boat coffee with the kids after my swim, Gerry’s coffee at the station with Mary and another coffee on the pier with Michael after work; where we sat and watched the seagulls hovering on the wind gusting over the pier wall.
The seagulls always seem to capture the mood. When the wind is blowing, as it was today, they neatly line up in an orderly fashion on the grass over at Red Island, facing into the wind. They have it all figured out. I also watch them out of the kitchen window facing down the buzzard that has been hanging around of late. I’m so up for the seagulls. When we moved into the bungalow the buzzard paid a visit, perching on the fence outside, looking in the window. I hadn’t noticed him for a long time until recently, where he’s been a daily feature. It’s fascinating to watch him hovering above his prey and then going in for the kill. I can’t help but think that maybe the receiver sent him!
Our friend Pat bought the house which was a good outcome for us and has certainly made moving a lot easier. He is a good friend to us. He is family really and our eldest daughter will remain living in the house with her boyfriend (Pat’s son). We were laughing earlier about the big move she will have to make. She has to cross the corridor! We don’t have too far to go ourselves. We will be moving back down to the South Strand where we will be renting “Aunty’ Margery’s house. (Again, we have good friends who made this happen). I always knew Margery as ‘Aunty’ Margery because she was my friend Schira’s aunty. Schira lived next door to us and and my siblings and I practically grew up in the Reddy’s house. I remember how Margery and her sister ‘Aunty’ Breda would arrive for coffee every Sunday after mass. There was always lots of laughter.
The Buzzard
But back to sheds and junk. I will go back into the barn tomorrow. There’s lots of good stuff in there too. Stuff I didn’t want to deal with the last time we moved house. (Don’t they say that one man’s junk is another man’s treasure). I’m hoping the wind will change direction from an easterly and revert to our prevailing westerly wind. When you live on the east coast and the wind blows from the west, it feels as if it has your back.
I will finish with a well known Irish blessing that seems appropriate (that I looked up) “May the road rise up to meet you. May the wind always be at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face, and rains fall soft upon your fields. And until we meet again…….Think I’ll leave it at that.
So 2020 is nearly over. Good. Many storms to weather and they are not over yet. But that’s on a macro level. We are still standing and not everyone can say that. On a micro level we can focus on the nice stuff. We are looking forward to Christmas.
Christmas Greetings from Skerries Springboards! by Niamh Fardey -FARDS CARDS
Santa came early for me with a gift of the ‘must have’ pandemic accessory. (It’s a must have in Skerries anyway). My sister-in law Kathryn had very kindly put my name on a Dryrobe in her swimming group’s bulk order. The group name is “Fair Weather Swimmers”, but it seems Dryrobes were called in because the swimming activity strayed way beyond the fair weather to the positively Baltic weather. Orders of Dryrobes have gone through the roof apparently and there are waiting lists, so I was very lucky to get my hands on one.
I was a bit sheepish at first. The slagging about Dryrobes has taken off big time. There are hilarious sketches on Social Media about the Dryrobe brigade frequenting the coastal coffee shops talking about their “sunrise swims”. Skerries is no different. Throughout the town you can spot groups in their Dryrobes going for their well-earned hot drinks after their dip in the Irish Sea. It’s like a damper, less glamourous version of apres-ski. It just shows; this pandemic has certainly made us all more resourceful. Beggars can’t be choosers and all that!
One thing I love is the fact that this new-found love for swimming in the Winter seems to attract all ages; from teenagers right up to octogenarians. The original cold-water swimmers in Skerries, “The Frosties,” have had to stagger their swims to avoid the hoard of enthusiastic newbies (like myself) that the high-tide attracts. On occasion the Springboards has been very busy, especially when the sun is shining. But even on the worst of days there is a fair trickle of hardy candidates willing to brave it. It’s not just the Springboards that is popular. It’s everywhere. In fact, a week ago we were braving some big waves and an awful lot of seaweed at the entrance to the harbour at the North Strand. And of course, there’s the deep water at the Captains, which is almost always (apart from the odd storm) an option. So, where there’s a will there’s a way.
Sometimes I hook up with the “Fair Weather Swimmers”, especially when Michael makes a guest appearance the odd weekend. More often than not, I swim with “The Quiddles”. My school friends, Carol and Margot are founding members and they cajole and encourage me. They even, on occasion, managed to persuade me to get out of my warm bed for a sunrise swim! I confess I was a bit smug when I mentioned it to the younger two when driving them to school, but there was little to no interest shown. Obviously not my target audience.
So back to my new Dryrobe. I got to use it for the first time at the Springboards the other morning. I sat, after my swim, in the wind and rain on the concrete bench drinking my tea and chatting with the girls. I was completely cocooned and not convulsively shivering as I normally do. I reckon with a Dryrobe I could take on anything…… I could weather many a storm. I could even handle the slagging that is sure to come my way for wearing a Dryrobe. 2021- Bring it on!
A few days ago we went for a drive. An escape. We are limited to Dublin of course with the lockdown so we decided to drive south along the coast. It was a beautiful sunny day and when we hit Malahide Michael suggested that we go for a swim in the Forty Foot in Sandycove. It was unplanned so we stopped off at Dunnes stores in Cornelscourt and picked up some togs and towels. My grandfather Barney, used to swim at the Forty Foot every day in the Summer after he retired to Dalkey. That was back in the days when it was a male only swimming place. No togs needed in those times! Apart from a look at the Forty Foot on a cold Winter’s day, I had never swum there. I was very taken by the place. It was magical with the sun shining on the water and heads bobbing in the sea. It was like an outdoor Lido. It was lunchtime and it was obvious that office workers, amongst others, were having a lunchtime swim. Everyone was cheerfully soaking up the last of the late summer sunshine. We had a lovely swim.
Skerries Frosties- Holmpatrick Cove Swim
Skerries is a swimming town, which is no surprise really given that it has water on three sides. I come from a swimming family. My father taught generations of Skerries children to swim. First in the sea some time around 1960. They used a long pole with a hoop at the end at the Springboards. Later on in 1968 Skerries Swimming Club moved to Gormanston College swimming pool, which is about 15k away from Skerries. When we were very young we used to go there in Charlie Fanning’s minibus. That was before we got the old Renault 12. My father brought myself and my siblings down every Saturday morning for our swimming lessons.
Gormanston was a great tradition. My father taught the littlest, who would swim a width and have to get out of the pool to run around again. You worked your way up the widths as you got better. From Mr Ryan to Mr McGloughlin to Mr Maloney, Mr Sexton and then you would hit Mr Carmichael. Now, Mr Carmichael was a man dedicated to teaching swimming, but his children skills were lacking to say the least! He was terrifying- God rest him. He used to shout at the kids and blow his whistle. My siblings and I were lucky because we had our father as a bit of a cushion. There was a great motivation to get through this width quickly as you would be moved up to the sanctuary of the next session, where you got to swim lengths.
When my eldest children were young we had the same routine. We went to Gormanston every Saturday morning to swimming. My father had moved on from teaching the young kids. After 37 years and a couple of operations he figured that if he didn’t give it up when my youngest brother finished, he might have to see his grandchildren out. So he wisely quit while he was ahead. When we brought our children my niece Ciara (on the Branagan side) was shepherding the little ones through the first width. It went from Ciara to Conor, to Barry, to David to Peter. Same process but a new generation of children who, as a sign of the times, now called their teachers by their first names!
Gormanston was great. Lovely Art Deco architecture. We all have great memories going there. The Galas. The echos and smell of chlorine as we ran through the entrance. The conker (chestnut) trees in the grounds. The day Mr Carmichael fell in the pool. (There was a rumour going around that he couldn’t actually swim!) The struggle to get there on time and the disappearing goggles that drove me insane. (I always thought a good title for a parenting book would be Gumshields and Goggles!). But the roof fell in on the swimming pool and it was closed down about seven years ago. My youngest didn’t get beyond widths to lengths, which was such a pity; the difference between an able swimmer and a great swimmer.
Skerries Swimming Club also has a series of sea races during the Summer. They date back as far as the 1920s. They had petered out but were revived by Leonard McGloughlin and friends in 1941. They have wonderful old trophies and names such as The Island Swim, The Round the Head Swim, The South Strand Swim. We had many a trophy on our mantlepiece growing up, gathering spools of thread, keys and general junk. We even borrowed the Rose Bowl trophy for our youngest’s Christening! The sea races are still going strong today. Mr Carmichael used to run the races with Leonard in the early days. (nowadays it’s Barry Sexton and David McGloughlin). To Mr Carmichael’s credit he gave up endless hours voluntarily to Skerries Swimming Club and ran a tight ship. Nobody dared question the handicap he gave them. And if you didn’t go around the last buoy at the end of the race there was hell to pay! I remember, way back when I was heavily pregnant with my first child, myself and my friend Carol (who was heavily pregnant with her last child!) decided to do the swim from The Captains to the back of the harbour. Poor Mr Carmichael didn’t know where to look at the sight of the two quite heavily pregnant women. A bad jellyfish sting put a hold on my sea racing career (not when I was pregnant thankfully) but I reckon after twenty years it might be time to make a come -back.
Over the years the town has tried to lobby for a swimming pool. There was the Ballast Pit proposal that lots of us contributed to, but it got pulled from Skerries to Balbriggan. (we got our money back). But unfortunately a pool didn’t even get built in Balbriggan. And there was the pool we were going to build at Holmpatrick Cove. It would have been similar in size to the pool in Gormanston which had served us all well over the years before it was closed down. One of the few objectors said the pool wasn’t big enough, that it should be an Olympic sized pool. I love your thinking mate- but get real! He also said we didn’t need a hotel in Skerries or a “dead-end walkway”. I think that was more to do with the airstrip and hangar he uses which was built on the coast without planning permission. An airstrip that cuts across the coastal walkway. Anyway, I’m sure he is happy now as he gets to fly his little airplane totally uninterrupted. These days he has taken to giving a little victory flight over the bungalow we live in. I must let him know when we leave so he can return to his old route over Shenick Island, (the island with the Special Protection Area (SPA)- the European Directive to not disturb the birds!).
Speaking of swimming and Skerries, every Summer (except for this one of course due to Covid) we have Water Safety Week. It is a national initiative and like Skerries Swimming Club, it is all done on a voluntary basis. Watersafety week in Skerries has the biggest turnout nationally and there are waiting lists to get in. In 2019 I think about 400 kids took part. (I’m open to correction as it was probably even more than that). If you look at the South Strand on Watersafety week (or sometimes the North strand depending on which way the wind is blowing) there is a tented village set up for the week as the various classes go on. Parents often down tools to spend a week on the beach and the picnics are legendary. I never quite got my act together on the baking front, but I was lucky that my friend Debbie is a great baker and she took pity on my kids over the years. The pay-off was the barbeque we had at the end of the week in our front garden. That was always a good night!
Watersafety week makes for hardy kids. They get put through the mill come rain or shine, staying in the water for up to half an hour. For the more senior swimmers at the Springboards, that can be twice a day as well as the Lifesaving theory classes on the grass. The supermarkets run out of hot chocolate that week! All the kids come away with great life skills and a lot of respect for the sea. This knowledge has helped two of my children and my niece and nephew, out of sticky situations in the past.
From hardy kids to hardy adults. We have a cold-water swimming group in Skerries called the Frosties. As you can probably guess, they swim all year round. Only the odd hurricane would deter them from their daily swim. I couldn’t contemplate doing that and you will never see me in the water for the annual Christmas swim. I’ll leave that to Michael and the kids who, along with the Branagan family, go in for their swim outside the old family home on the South Strand, before the customary Christmas drinks.
When Holmpatrick Cove was refused by An Bord Pleanala two walks to the site took place as a show of support for the development. The planning board had said that Holmpatrick Cove was rural and distant from the town. To show what a load of rubbish that was the Frosties decided to swim from the Springboards to Holmpatrick. Only in Skerries….God, I love this town!
When we came home from our trip to the Forty Foot the tide was in that evening and we felt we should round the day off with a swim in the Springboards. It was probably motivated by loyalty to Skerries, having “crossed over to the south side” earlier that day. So, with the sun lower in the sky and still glistening across the water, we had another swim. A great way to finish off a Summer season of sea swimming- two swims in the one day. The problem is that the sun is still shining- not a problem of course- but it’s making me feel guilty. Maybe there’s a few more dips in it before the Winter closes in….
The Field 