WATCH: Women of the Islands - why I fell in love with Heir Island off Cork coast

WHEN architecture graduate Claudia Meloni first moved to Dublin for a six-month stint as an au pair to improve her English, she never imagined that she would be permanently leaving her Mediterranean island home of Sardinia.

That has a population of 1,639,500 and now she lives permanently on an island in West Cork with a population of 30 - but that’s the kind of thing that happens when you fall in love.

Claudia fell in love not only with Ireland, and with her fiancé Craig Moore, but also hook, line and sinker with Heir island, off the Cork coast, the place where she has now made her permanent home.

She moved from Dublin to Heir Island with Craig six years ago and together they run a hospitality business. Craig had wanted to move there permanently for some time, having spent ten years in Dublin, but it was when he met and fell in love with Claudia that he knew that this dream could be a reality.

“Craig says he would not have moved back to the island full time on his own, it was meeting me that encouraged this move,” said Claudia.

“We first met each other where we were both working in the same hotel in Temple Bar in Dublin city centre. 

I had only intended to stay for a short time in Ireland, but was really enjoying it, so I ended up staying for much longer.

Craig has always called Heir Island home. His parents Jim and Patricia Moore had set up a sailing school there, and eventually they moved to living full time on the island where they have since retired, so it was the place that Craig would always go to spend Christmas and the holidays.

Claudia said: “The first time that he took me to Heir Island to meet his family six years ago, I was thinking beforehand that visiting an island sounded great, and I imagined myself lying on the beach and getting a suntan, but when I finally got there the weather was absolutely miserable.

“But that did not stop me falling totally in love with the island.

I have to say that there were three things in particular that especially made me fall in love with this beautiful place. 

"Firstly, in Dublin, and in other cities, you forget about the stars, but when I saw the night sky on the island, all you could see were the stars glittering in the sky, they were so clear, it was really beautiful.

“I was there for the first time in late August, so I also saw so many shooting stars, it was just incredible.

“When we first went there together, the weather was still warm, so we slept with the windows open, and all you could hear was the sound of the waves, this was the second thing which I adored.

“The third thing was that I remember going for a night-time walk under a beautiful full moon and all you could hear was the sound of the crickets. It reminded me of Sardinia, the island seemed like a paradise to me. 

I loved it straight away, and I still do.

“Some of my friends said to me - how can you go and live in such a place, there are no shops or anything, and hardly any people, but none of these things bother me at all.

“I am always so busy, especially during the summer. In the winter, Craig and I sometimes take trips off the island to go and visit friends in Cork or Dublin, or we go out to the mainland for dinner to a restaurant, or to the cinema. 

I go off to the shops regularly too, but even if weeks go by and I don’t get off the island, it does not bother me at all, I love being here.

In the summer, Claudia’s days pass in a whirlwind of busy activity running a bed and breakfast, Heir Island House, also known as The Pink House, the only bed and breakfast on Heir island. Her days usually start around 7.30am and she often does not get to bed until around 11.30pm as there are always so many jobs to be done - preparing full Irish breakfasts, cleaning rooms, sorting out new guests arriving, making afternoon tea and sandwiches, and then getting the toppings ready for the wood-fired pizza oven to go on the dough, which Craig makes from scratch in what is called the ‘PizzHeiria’.

She is also busy organising her wedding, which is coming up shortly on September 23 in Sardinia. She has most of the preparations ready, and will be going there in advance to make sure that everything is in order.

When Craig proposed in November, she decided to book an old converted barn back home to have the celebrations close to her parents’ place. She has her dress organised, which she bought in Italy, but she brought it back with her to the island where Craig’s aunt, a seamstress, is making some modifications.

“The dress is just a simple design, I’m not really ‘girly girly’ and I’d rather a big party and happy people than a dress which you would only get to wear for one day.

“September is the best time for a wedding in Sardina as the weather usually gets a bit cooler then, and also the business on Heir island gets quieter. “

Claudia’s family - she has five siblings - were amongst those who experienced some of the recent sizzling temperatures when the mercury hit 40Cin many parts of the Mediterranean.

“Luckily for my parents, they live in a house which was designed to keep cool during heatwaves, but I was feeling concerned for one of my brothers who is a baker, and another who is a farmer, during the recent high temperatures, it was not very comfortable for them having to work in that heat.

“My dad is a retired farmer, and when I was a little girl I used to love being out with him and helping him on the farm.

 I used to spend hours there just playing in nature, so I guess that’s where I first got a taste for the quiet country places.

She loves going for rambles with her dog on Heir and walking ancient tracks surrounded by wild heather, or over to the beach in Paris - not the French capital, but the name of a part of the island. Yes, you can go to Paris in West Cork!

The island itself is situated in Roaringwater Bay, a name given to it because of its wild appearance during Atlantic gales. You can see across the small stretch of water from Cunnamore Pier straight over to the pier on Heir island, a mere four-minute ferry ride across.

There are many outcrops, rocks and other small islands scattered throughout Roaringwater Bay,such as East and West Skeam, Calf island, Horse island, Castle island, Long Island and Goat island, and they are often referred to as `Carbery’s hundred isles’. Some of these islands used to have populations but are no longer inhabited.

After the holidaymakers have departed, leaving the very small full-time population of 30 people on Heir Island in the winter, it usually gets much quieter. This is when Claudia likes to catch up on her online shows on some of the streaming services. This year the broadband on the island was upgraded and Claudia says that it’s really good now.

“I understand that island life is not for everybody but especially since Covid I have heard of a lot more people coming to set up homes in West Cork, and in rural areas where there is good broadband people can set up a business and work from home.

“I’d love to see more families and younger people moving to the island, and it would also be great to see people starting some nice businesses that keep in tone with island life. Most of the houses here are holiday homes, and they are only used two or three weeks of the year. I really hope that there will be some social houses built on the island, it would help to make island life here more lively and sociable, especially in the winter. There’s plenty of room for more people here, but the big problem is that we lack proper accommodation for people who want to come and live here full time.

“Not having suitable and affordable accommodation is really one of the biggest challenges which we have towards making island life sustainable for the future, and I really hope that this will change. I look forward to seeing more people living on Heir Island who would enjoy all that the island has to offer and to build up our small population. It’s just an incredible place to live and I feel so lucky to be here.”

Next week: Mags Murphy, of Sherkin Island.