Sheer bliss... carefree summer days in West Cork with my beloved grandchildren

We never went on family holidays back in the days of my youth.

I’m not saying that in any ‘poor mouth’ manner - no, back in the 1960s and early ’70s I don’t recall many families we knew ever going away on holidays.

We heard of people from the city of Cork who might go to Crosshaven or Kinsale or some exotic place like that for a weekend, or maybe even a week in August. Caravan parks were coming in, and in Garryvoe and Redbarn we knew of relations and friends who’d go there.

Sometimes, the whole family, children and parents, would head off and sometimes the breadwinner - usually the father - might go to work from there and be back at the seaside by evening time.

We had a mixed farm so there was never a dull moment or a ‘slack’ period in terms of farming activities. What, with cows calving and sheep lambing in the spring, and cows to be milked all year round, holidays were never a priority.

With Mam rearing five of us, I suppose spare cash wasn’t too flush either, but in fairness I never felt deprived or jealous of how others were getting on.

Back then, the ‘holiday scene’ wasn’t what it is today. A plane journey was only for going to Lourdes. The idea of going to a foreign country to do nothing for a week or a fortnight was an alien concept - unheard of, and sure, in fairness, wouldn’t you be bored or burned or both?

Just last week, the three generations of our family went for a short family holiday - about two and a half days in total - with 19 of us together away in beautiful West Cork.

As we headed off on a misty Monday, I was thinking of ‘trips’ 60 years ago. Back then, on fine summer Sundays - and we had plenty of them! - Youghal was our preferred and favourite destination. Going to Youghal was second nature to us when Dada was alive and big into greyhounds - the Track in Youghal was a regular stop for Dan Arnold. Even after his death in 1961, we kept a few (slow) greyhounds for nearly another decade.

On alternate Sundays during the school summer holidays, Paddy Geary would milk the cows on the Sunday evening and the day-trip to Youghal for us small children was something to look forward to.

Though I’m no lover of the sea and have a bit of a fear of waves and water, the salty air on Claycastle and over to Redbarn was something to inhale.

I suppose the bumpers at Perks and the slot machines that took old pennies with the hen and chicks were such novelties to us also.

Buying boiled water to make the tea and throwing the green Foxford rug (we still have it) on the ground for the picnic seemed exotic. Sandwiches made from Martin’s bread and our own ham never tasted so good. Coming home by night from the Track, we’d have the treat of a bag of chips, but never on a Sunday.

The train-loads of day-trippers from Cork city would pull in with a cloud of smoke early in the afternoon and it seemed as if half of Cork came to Youghal every Sunday.

Oh, to think of it, - you know, the Greenway to Youghal is a great idea, but what a shame the train will never again run down through the heart of East Cork, but shure, I’m sentimental!

As we reached the Park Hotel in Clonakilty for our break last week, the idea of being away from cows, calves and cattle for a few days right smack in the middle of the summer, wow!

So there we were - two of us ‘elders’, six in the next generation and 11 grandchildren. I must say we had an absolutely wonderful time, then again, West Cork is a great place to holiday, especially with children of varying ages.

The first evening when we all gathered together for a meal, truly I felt emotional. I was sad in a way that my parents never got to enjoy a time like this with extended family. My father hardly got to know his five children before he died, never mind grandchildren.

True enough, we weren’t, in Bing Crosby’s words “Sun-tanned, wind-blown, honeymooners at last alone”, but I was “feeling far above par-oh, how lucky we are!”

My melancholy of times past and what might have been but never was soon faded. They say when you have a grandchild it fills a space in your heart that you never knew was empty, and I swear that’s really the full truth.

You know the way people sometimes joke that the best thing about grandchildren is that ‘you can give them back every night’, well, sometimes if one is tired you might think that way. Other times, you just want to hug them and listen to their talk and stories endlessly.

We are so lucky as grandparents because our grandchildren all live fairly close to us so we can see them regularly.

Back in the last century, we did a pre-marriage course but in reality I can’t remember if the rearing of children was included in its content -but how to deal with, listen to and love grandchildren certainly wasn’t explained! Like many aspects of life, we just have to pick it up as we go along.

I knew just one of my four grandparents - my Twomey grandmother - and she died when I was 14. Like so many of her generation, she wore ‘black’ from the time her own husband had died - nearly 30 years before, that was the way things were done in days of yore.

In he late 1960s, herself and mam used go for a short break in the summer - staying with Mrs McGrath in the lovely village of Ardmore.

Clonakilty is a super town. Tourism is part and parcel of the place and the smiling faces and welcoming words are as much part of the ‘tourism product’ as the quality or the price!

Imagine, until last week I’d never been to the Model Railway Village in Clon’ - what an amenity to have. I love history so while all the third generation were following the choo-choos around, I was able to learn about the railway history of the area.

To think that all of West Cork, including Bantry, was once rail-linked - wasn’t it a shame that we scrapped so much ‘connectivity’ - same as in Youghal.

In fairness, the grandchildren didn’t allow us much time to ponder on economic and social issues while on our holiday! How right they were - we were there for fun, fun and more fun, and with absolutely brilliant indoor and outdoor facilities, we were blessed - and the weather wasn’t too bad either.

What is personality, and how come all the little cousins are so wonderfully different? Well, we enjoyed them so much as they played, ate and drank and asked so many times, ‘Grandad, why, who, what, which, when…’ and so on.

I’m often accused of ‘living in the past’, but then I read somewhere, sometime that grandparents can help their grandchildren to gain a sense of history and provide them with a vital link to the past, so maybe that’s another useful role for me.

Looking at them playing in the West Cork sunshine last week, I thought of my parents, my parents in law and all those great people gone before us who have made us what we are.

When we came home, I looked in Auntie Jo’s box of old pictures. I took out the snap of my own great grandmother, Mary Barry, nee Ring. She was born in 1825, nearly 200 years ago.

Our grandchildren are her great, great, great grandchildren - ah yes, time moves on, but we had a great holiday, just a few days but unforgettable days nevertheless.