The quest for a holiday home to call my own
NOT to put too fine a point on it, Covid, although I’m thankfully very healthy still, has changed my life, not least because, as you read here six months ago, I was just about to buy a holiday cottage in the far west of Ireland.
On Lettermore Island to be precise, which is joined to mainland County Galway, by a causeway; one pub, one garage and one shop, and all in the one property of course, with stunning scenery, and wildlife at every turn.
Maumeen Lodge had my name all over it, a three bedroomed, white-washed cottage within a few feet of the wild Atlantic.
I’d been wanting to do it for years, not just for me, and latterly Joanie Lucy, but for my three children, and two granddaughters, for while I’m here, and for when I’m not.
Not trying to be mawkish, it was just a warm and comforting feeling to be able to achieve it.
But then, the dream turned into a nightmare when, literally one week later, as I was due to go back and sign the dotted line, Coronavirus shut Ireland, and back came the word, you’re not going anywhere Woody, and yes, the house is now sold.
So far so bad, but hey we all had our health and five months later we still do, and although I might be a stone or so heavier, lockdown in Top Mossley has been easy, and this in spite of living with four girls of six, nine, 12 and 30 years old.
Not a cross word the whole time, some wonderful walks, and I’ve even managed to wean them, almost completely to a whole larder of fresh food, even seafood.
Well, that’s a bit of a lie, as only two girls tried the fruits of the ocean, including Joanie, but she’s now taken the 5th Amendment on prawns, mussels and scallops, and there’s absolutely no chance with oysters.
Having said that, I have had great fun hiding courgettes and aubergines in some dishes, and then taking an insanely puerile joy at breaking the news to the girls.
Maybe ‘it’ has got to me after all.
Seriously though, you don’t need me to tell what a calamitous time we are going through, but you need to make the best of it if you can.
And we are lucky for sure.
Wildlife highlights include some of the amazing photographs being shared by readers on these pages, the visiting Bearded Vulture, as I write, floating on those nine feet wings above Dovestone Reservoir, a weasel giving me the eye near our house, and the ever changing skies from my new eyrie as I watch the buzzards, sparrow hawks and jackdaws going about their lives, oblivious to me at eye level.
Every cloud, because, wait for it, if we had bought the little white house in Ireland six months on, we still could not visit.
A close shave, and the travel ban gave me the chance to rethink and spend countless enjoyable hours, largely on Google Maps, researching buying somewhere closer to home, involving no flights or ferries, and I also thought outside of my long-held box-view of what I ‘thought’ I wanted.
I factored in, size, accessibility, travel time, security, cost, beaches, woods, pubs, wildlife, natural beauty, and quite simply all of the things that we have always enjoyed as a family.
It was obviously a long shot but, after a few near misses on Anglesey, The Lakes and North Yorkshire, oh and one where we would have woken up next to a Nuclear Power Plant conveniently just off the map, we found Kippford Bay in Dumfries & Gallowway, three hours door to door, and all boxes well and truly ticked.
On a small residential woodland park we bought a brand new, three bedded lodge named, with not one hint of irony, ‘The Irish Cottage’, by my six year old granddaughter Orlaith.
It’s forty feet by twelve feet, and I think underneath the decking there may lurk a couple of wheels, but don’t you dare call it a caravan. Only joking.
So there we were last weekend, van packed, cameras primed for the pine martens, red deer and red squirrels, set fair for our first holiday in the new place.
What could go wrong, yep you’ve guessed it, Scotland was shut overnight to people who live in Greater Manchester, and Covid struck again.
As Dick Dastardly might say, with Muttley chuckling in the background, ‘Drat, and double drat’, why oh why do the Government sneak out edicts by Twitter on a Friday night.
Am I missing something, apart from the trip?
Go on Muttley, give us a snigger.