How my mystery illness was cured by the Blaskets!
Couple’s life-changing swap of busy London for the slow lane
A COUPLE who quit London for the Blasket Islands and a life with no electricity or running water have revealed how a mystery illness disappeared due to lack of stress in their new wild location.
Nurse Emily Campbell, 28, who is originally from Cork, and her civil engineer boyfriend Daniel Regan, 30, were speaking as their time on the Great Blasket Island drew to a close.
The couple came to the island off Co. Kerry to run a coffee shop and accommodation, and its owners have advertised for a new caretaker duo to cover this year’s tourist season, from April to October, with applications closing in a week’s time, on January 18.
In recent years, over 100,000 people from around the world have applied for the post.
Appearing on Ben Fogle’s New Lives In The Wild, on Channel 5 this week, the couple said life on the island had its hardships, but also many unexpected rewards.
There is no electricity – the only light comes from candles or stoves – and there is no hot water. The only fresh running cold water comes from a spring located above some of the cottages on the island.
However, despite the challenges, Ms Campbell believed her new life had been less ‘emotionally draining’ than before.
‘I was burned out, my body was giving stress signals,’ she said.
She had been working as a children’s nurse at Great Ormond Street Hospital, and said that stress had caused her eyes to be sore and red, with the skin around it flaking off. Doctors and specialists were unable to diagnose the illness. But after moving to the Blaskets, the condition disappeared. She said her ultimate dream would be to live there and grow her own food, but the harsh conditions would make it tough.
The couple first met on a latenight London Underground journey, while they were both living in the city.
While renovating Mr Regan’s flat in Clapham, Ms Campbell saw an advert for the Great Blasket job, located at the most westerly point in Europe.
On a whim, she decided to apply, beating thousands of applicants.
The Great Blasket, about 2km off the coast, was inhabited until 1954, when it became unliveable, but it’s now visited by tourists who take a ferry from the mainland.
The couple were employed to run a cafe and three holiday lodges, but often were not visited for days on end if the bad weather prevented ferries from crossing.
Mr Regan revealed that they stocked up on hundreds of cans and often had ‘baked beans for dinner’ if they could not get food from the mainland.
‘To the west, there’s nothing until you reach Newfoundland in Canada,’ he said.
Ms Campbell added that the sun ‘sets in November and doesn’t appear until February’.
As it is too cold to live on the island after October, the couple have left since filming the television show, and are now travelling in Indonesia.
While they were on the Blaskets, they helped to preserve the island’s seal population, and took dips in the brisk sea – even if it was as cold as 16C in the water.
They also wrangled 200 sheep for farmers from the mainland that keep their flocks on the island.
Billy O’Connor and his partner Alice Hayes own the three cottages and a coffee shop on the island, and hire new caretakers every year to look after the properties. They are given food, board and a wage.
‘When we got offered an interview we were absolutely delighted to get to speak to Billy and Alice and were telling everyone. We had everyone crossing their fingers and toes and Emily’s mum even lit candles and had the rosary beads out,’ Mr Regan said last February.
‘Alice emailed us to offer us the position on a Monday morning and we leaped out of bed screaming with excitement. It didn’t start feeling real until we spoke to Billy and Alice on a video call after getting the offer.’
The Blaskets were inhabited for centuries by a small but close-knit Irish-speaking community of 100150 people. They didn’t use money but bartered, and followed a traditional way of life farming and fishing for their food.
But in the 1950s, the remaining 20 or so inhabitants were forced to move to the mainland as emergency services could not access the island in bad weather.
‘There’s nothing until Canada’