On the beach in Marble Hill, Donegal

Marble Hill has one of the loveliest beaches anywhere, I reckon. It’s very child friendly too, being gently shelving, and there’s a good watersport centre for surfing and windsurfing, plus canoeing. There used to be a lot of massively irritating speedboats for waterskiing, and those annoying machines for one which are the equivalent of a motorbike on water and which seem to be mainly designed for middle aged men with more money than sense. Luckily the beach now has blue flag status, which means those are banned. I am not one bit sorry to see them go. Before, it ruined our days out- it was as if you permanently had a wasp (or multiple wasps!) buzzing around your head!

The kids had barely stepped off the walkway and onto the beach before they were befriended by three children of similar age and were soon tearing around the beach digging sandcastles and having a great time! It was nice for me and Ian to watch them having fun and we were able to take it comparatively easy while they played.

We had so much fun that we returned the next day with a picnic, and the kids played around in the sea for a while. It felt a little weird being on the beach as an adult with kids, rather than BEING the kid who has been taken there by the parent. The beaches in the area make me think of blissful and seemingly endless summer holidays with my own parents up there, for some reason in my mind the sun always shone, it never rained. I know now that this cannot have been the case, but it makes me hope fervently that my own children will have such sunny and happy memories of their holidays in Donegal.

This is not our dog. It was just a friendly old hound who was roaming the beach looking for spare sandwiches- a gentle big thing! It wasn’t a stray and had a collar- it really annoys me when people don’t take better care of their pets.