Inishowen in the Sun

A spell of good weather does seem to invigorate people. It certainly has pepped up the aged parents. They were sufficiently energised by the present mild spell to indicate that they would quite like to sally forth from their abode. Accordingly I collected them in my horseless charabanc yesterday afternoon and we headed off into the sun kissed afternoon. They had expressed a preference for the delights of the Inishowen peninsula and I accordingly set forth in that direction.

 

Here and there an occasional thin strand of cirrus cloud drifted across the sky but that apart its bright blueness stretched towards the hazy horizon. The waters of the Lough were contentedly flat save where the wake from a small trawler disturbed the meniscus. The traffic was light, the temperature on the comfortable side of fresh, a comfortable day for car travel.

 

The route taken was familiar to both myself and my parents although not one that they have been on for some years. They recalled previous trips and the frequent visits to an elderly cousin of my father's who lived in Greencastle until his death in the early nineteen seventies. I was regaled,(and not for the first time), about how my grandfather had spent his summers in Moville and travelled to and from work in Londonderry on the paddle steamer the SS Seamore. It does seem a long time ago, - a different world with a different pace of life, - and it was. The Great War was still fourteen years in the future.