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This was a big expedition, in fact we had rather too many
cars for the usual lay-bye and were lucky that the people
at Ceol na Mara let us park there - thanks very much. We were
quite a big team, eleven explorers: Alasdair C., Chris, Edward,
Fern, Frederik and Jan Hendrik, Loren, Matthew and Matthew
Evans, Robbie C. and Rowan. There were nine adults, apart
from myself: Howard, John Dove, Johnny, Liam, Lucy A., Michael,
Philippa, Sandra and Sharon B., with Ellie looking under all
the rocks.
The weather was far from promising and I was expecting a bit
of trouble from midges, but they kept away. We walked carefully
round to the path and set off up past the alder plantations
where everyone learned how to distinguish an alder from a
hazel and Jan Hendrik found some young hazelnuts.
We pushed on up the hill to the big waterfall, which was noisy
but almost invisible through the trees, it's better in wintertime.
Then without much delay we took the right hand path and carried
on to the top of the hill. By this time the group had spread
out a bit, which was a shame since only those at the front
saw the woodpecker.
When everyone had caught up we turned towards the sea and
walked across the heather to a little knoll where we stopped
for a wafer break and heard the story about the fire long
ago.
Much rested, we set off again and very soon Robbie had found
an interesting caterpillar. I think it was destined to become
a red sword grass butterfly. Anyway, I got a picture of it
and one of the group with Laudale House in the distance.
We followed the stream down to the road and crossed it. This
was a very overgrown area and we had to push through the bushes
and bracken to reach the old boundary wall. While waiting
there we saw a tree creeper which stayed long enough for most
of the explorers to get a view of it. Then we walked round
the mysterious heaps of stones and found an old stone house
before we crossed to the beach.
We walked round the water's edge, some closer to the water
than others, and eventually got to the bay where everyone
examined the rock piles with a piece of limestone and the
boys had an opportunity to get stuck in the wet clay. Finally,
and very carefully, we went back along the road to the cars.
John
Dye
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