1916 - 2016 The Battle Of The Somme Remembered.

I have always had a fascination with the First World.  I think it was reading about the First World War poets like Wilfred Owen when I was a teenager.  Not forgetting the coach trip to London to the Imperial War Museum and I saw 'Big Bertha' that used to fire across the English Channel.  It was also the former site of Bedlam.  

Wilfred Owen and JRR Tolkien both fought at the Battle of the Somme.  Remarkably Tokien still believed in God even after witnessing the carnage of the theatre of war on that fateful day in July and the following months in 2016.  Somebody died every eight seconds.  The historians say it was lions lead by donkeys.  

I remember in about 1981 when my mother's uncle came to my Eighteenth birthday celebration.  He was about eighty and insisted that he bought me a pint of bitter.  Then he said he was going to have a dance with all the "young lasses."  He was a remarkable man and my mother told me later he had fought at the battle of the Somme but he never ever talked about it.  He also lost two cousins there.  

They are heroes who we will never forget for giving us our freedom.  Motorhead sum it all up for me in the following song: 1916.

Another Carboot Sale Bargain.

Sorry I haven't blogged for a couple of weeks.  I got myself another bargain the other Sunday morning.  It's an oil painting about eight inches by eight inches.  I paid the princely sum of two Euros for it.  To those of you who were good at metalwark at school.  You will know it's the 'Gleaner's" painted by Jean-Francois Millet.

Apparently even today peasants in France have the right to glean the fields for Corn...  I love the colourful dresses and I think rural life should always be celebrated no matter how hard and difficult it was.

I couldn't believe the Brexit result.  Yes we all know the EEC is far from perfect.  But what power will the UK have now she no longer will have any say?  But there is however talk that the British Parliament can vote it out and the Queen can have the final say.  Suppose if all else fails.  British businesses and citizens can always move over here to their near neighbour Ireland and live in an EEC country?

What did you think of Glastonbury on the BBC?  Give me ELO any day than the modern stuff!  

One Of The Most Beautiful Beaches In Ireland.

We went to Inch beach in county Kerry on Sunday.  It's 3 miles long and incredibly beautiful.  The car park is free and lots of people park and drive a long the beach.  There's a pub and a restaurant, surf schools and wind yacht surfing..

It was a location used in the film: "Ryan's Daughter."  Do you have a favourite beach in the British Isles?  

If you want a break from overcrowded beaches and madding crowds.  You could always visit Ireland.  She's such a beautiful country especially when the weather is so marvellous at the moment.  If it rained at night and the sun shone in the day time.  Life would be just perfect.  

Hedgehog Comes To Visit Our Smallholding

I saw this dear fellow going for a saunter along the drive in front of the bungalow this morning.  I haven't seen one (alive) for a few years.  Apparently their population is twenty five percent less than it was twenty five years a go.  Modern farming methods and the use of pesticides and insecticides are said to be the cause of their decline.

 A rather cute and unassuming Mr or Mrs hedgehog on our drive.  They don't seem to be in the least bit  aggressive and do a great job removing the slugs and snails.

Number 2 son grabbed my other son's welding gloves and carried the hedge hog to safety.

The weather's been "skorchio" here in Ireland for the last few weeks.  Long may it be so.

Have you seen any hedgehogs lately?

We actually sat on the patio last night looking at the bay.  I had a few cans of Newcastle Brown and J had a jug of home made Sangria.  It's great living on the Irish Riviera.  Till it rains of course!

How Much Is That Moo Cow In The Window?

We went up country to get a part for one of our smallholding machines the other day.  A 398 miles (can't work in Kilometres at my age) round trip via good roads, bad roads, country lanes and toll motorways.  The road surfaces on the toll motorways are excellent.  The roads signs in the Republic of Ireland are in Kilometres and the motorways are more like dual carriage ways with only 2 lanes.  There also pretty quiet.  They remind me of old new reel clippage of when the M1 opened in England in the sixties.  

Any road.  We walked round Tullow while they made us a new cable and I spotted this butchers with a fantastic USP.   The animals in the window were a delight to see and somebody had obviously gone to a lot of trouble putting on such a display.  I noticed 2 German supermarkets had moved into town recently and quite a few of the local shops in the high street were closed or seemed to be closing down.  I suppose like so much of rural businesses in Ireland they are dying or on their last legs.  When will the recession ever end?

We often go in the cut price supermarkets ourselves and I think that price seems to be more important than loyalty or perhaps even quality.  Day to day living in the UK and Ireland is far too expensive compared to countries like Poland and Portugal which I have visited twice each in the last few years.  You can get a pint (large glass)of lager in the Algarve for 2 Euros.  You can pay five Euros or more in Ireland.  How much is a pint of beer in Egnland these days?  

On the way home we travelled via Wexford and found ourselves at a toll booth.  We paid the 3 Euros forty toll and a lovely English lady said:

"Thank you very much.  Good bye and God bless and have a safe journey home."

On the return to West Cork we stopped outside Cork at a petrol station.  There were 2 Police vehicles with 'armed response unit' painted on the cars liveries.  We thought:

"Hey up.  It's a siege or a stick up!"  

The good wife filled up the pick up with 20 Euros of diesel and went to pay the cashier.  I looked up to the cafe/restaraunt windows over the petrol station.  The boys in blue looked to being having:

"A nice cup of tea."  

Phew!  

We stopped in Ballineen at the Lantern chip shop.  We bought our selves a large portion of chips (two forks) for 3 Euros twenty between us.  I am sure they gave us five pounds of chips.  Not bad hey.  A day out and a slap up meal for two.  

Enjoying Our Smallholding Flowers.

The weather's been pretty good for the last week.  The hedges and grass are growing like mad and there areolenty of cottage perennial plants coming into flower.  Below in the wall border there are Forget-Me-Nots, Arum Lily's and Aquilegia "Grandma's Bonnets' showing off all their splendour and Array.

The Arum Lilies should have been out around Easter, but they are very late this year.  I love the Folklore connected to so many of our plants names.  Apparently there was an English knight walking by the side of this river (like you do) in full armour carrying a massive posey of forget me nots and they caused him to fall in.  He started to drown and handed over the flowers and said: "Forget me not!"

That's a terracotta ("real plastic") containing 'London Pride' or Saxifrage, "St Patrick's Cabbages." They are said to be the first plants to re-colonize the bomb sites after the blitz.  

Every Hiker And Farmer? Needs A Good Hat.

That's my trusty Sheep's Head Way baseball cap.  I have been advertising the way on my hikes over the last few weeks.  Since we sold the cattle we have been making plans.  

The first one is for me to get fit because I am walking the Dingle Way in August with an old friend.   So I have started pounding the old tarmac, boreens, mountain paths and bog for the last fortnight.  Already I have lost 9 Pounds in weight and feel better physically than I have for many a moon.

The Sheeps Head Way is very peaceful and incredibly beautiful.  Especially when you are on your own on top of the hills looking down at the bay.  It's sounds strange but it's like you become part of the rock, grass, mountains...  Walking on tracks that your ancestors walked probably  thinking the same philosophical thoughts and thanking God that you love in such a beautiful place.  

The other plan was to sell some of the land and buy an house or apartment in Portugal.  Eventually we (me and the missus) will retire there and the two lads will still have an house each and a few acres in Ireland.  

So we contacted a few local dairy farmers and asked them if they wanted to buy a ten acre parcel of land.  They both made us offers which we thanked them for but it wasn't the market price we wanted.  So we paid for two estate agents valuations and one undervalued the land by twenty thousand less than we were offered by a local farmer.    

It looks like we might have to put the land on the market, perhaps even sell the lot.  It's very difficult to remove sentiment from a family farm when you want to move on.  Anybody got any ideas what we should do?  Sol, Rachel or Cumbrian will know what to do?

Hope to catch up with all the other blogs I follow this week.