Showing posts with label Cork. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cork. Show all posts

Thursday 29 February 2024

February Favourites

 Thin on the ground... we've been short-staffed in work and I've had to do extra days, 








I spent a weekend mid-month with my sister. The weather was pretty dreary, but we went to a forest park beside a reservoir, also the national rowing centre of Ireland - it was a pleasant walk in spite of the misty drizzle, and there was a little van selling hot drinks which was a nice treat afterwards.



An abundance of red berries, which we presumed were not attractive to the birds as there were so many of them. 







I had a rather unnerving experience on Monday when my front brake stopped working shortly after leaving home. I had felt it was a bit loose and was thinking I must book a service sooner rather than later, when it went altogether. I was careful but not overly worried because I knew we had replaced the rear cable just before Christmas, so it was quite a shock when the rear brake too stopped working totally - luckily on the flat, and luckily near work so I didn't have too far to push the bike. And luckily a day C was working at home, and was able to come in at lunch and pick me up.
As I walked I passed this utility box, which has definitely been repainted as used to be something else altogether.
Two  new brake cables and everything is fine again, but especially when one was almost brand new it's a bit of a mystery to everybody how it could have happened.




Wednesday 31 January 2024

January favourites and a beach

 Are very thin on the ground...








I spent a weekend earlier in the month with my sister. On the Sunday morning we went to a beach in West Cork for a walk and a fish and chips (fries) lunch. Although the weather doesn't look great in the photos, it was beautiful for our drive over, and was in fact lovely for our walk. Queuing for the fish and chips was very windy, the beach much less so. 

Long Strand, Castlefreke.















Saturday 24 July 2021

Fota Arboretum

 On our second day, we visited Fota Arboretum. I had been there a couple of years ago with my sister, but C had never been. The walled gardens had fewer wildflower beds in them than on my previous visit, but were beautiful, and the shade in the arboretum was very welcome on a hot, sunny day. 

We got lucky with our timing after walking round the walled gardens and the working Victorian walled garden (staffed by volunteers. (I came home with some basil and some lysimachia, which you can see in the foreground of one of the photos of the pond. The lady who sold it to me warned me that it spread, but I knew that already. ) There was no queue at the coffee shop, and a couple of empty picnic benches to sit at. The jam for C's scone came in the neatest little folded paper pot, very eco-friendly. 



Our borage seems to be very late - this was in full bloom, and also in my brother's wildflower bed. Mine is only just barely starting to come into flower. I think it might be swamped by the Chinese Lanterns!



Angel's Fishing Rod



One of the many tree palms

A swamp cypress (taxodium distichum), and it really was vivid green. 

The lake was rather smelly, due to the algal bloom, but still very pretty.






Although I had chosen the day that, from the forecast, looked to be more cloudy and hence a bit better for photography, it was very bright sunshine and a bit too contrasty to be ideal. But a lovely day out. 


Tuesday 22 December 2020

Warm off the needles

 This sweater has been my pandemic project - it's a design by Joji Locatelli which I got from Ravelry. The construction is very satisfying - it's knit all in one piece. You start from the centre front and knit sideways to one side, then pick up from a provisional cast-on (bind on) and knit to the other side - a partial yoke is included in this section. Then you knit each sleeve down to the cuff, creating the back yoke in the process. The back is knit downwards, picked up from the yoke. Even the side seams aren't stitched - they're a 3-needle bind off. The only reason it took so long was my tiredness and inattention to detail a couple of times. Well, that and the fact that I used to be able to knit in work and that's a thing of the past - and hopefully the future again some time.  I'd actually bought the wool to make a sort of mediaeval panelled swing-type jacket but I couldn't get the tension right for that.




It looks better on - but by the time I arrived at my sister's last Friday after a trek across Cork city, I wasn't looking photogenic enough to ask her to take pictures. The weather forecast had been dire and I'd dressed for heavy rain which was over by the time I got there.


I'm including a few unedited photos (taken with my phone) from Friday. There was a Ferris Wheel set up on Grand Parade - to C's amazement when he saw the photo. He and his friend drove down the street at some stage, and he hadn't seen it. 

The next two are a nice initiative  called "The People's Parklet". This one is near my sister's, so I've seen it through several seasons now, as it was opened in July 2019.  The city is hoping to establish up to ten more. There's a small amount of seating, and they plant insect-friendly plants in the planter parts.  It's empty in this photo - but most times I have seen it, there have been people sitting and making good use of it. 


And a sign of the times - though given the Irish climate in the first place, plus the fact that there's always a cold wind off the river, I saw this little dining domes outside one of the restaurants on Lapps Quay. 







Saturday 3 October 2020

Utility Boxes

 A couple more utility boxes - one from Cork, when we were down a few weekends ago before we were, once again, limited to travel within Dublin. No expedition to the Galway/Clare border to look for sloes this year: when the park where we have gathered them before proved fruitless, I bought some raspberries and we will try raspberry gin instead. This utility box is one of a series, but by the time I passed some more, I was fully laden and less inclined to stop.

The other one is on the main road outside the Botanic Gardens, and I've always wanted to take a picture of it. Last weekend C went back to the car, and I went out the front gate and walked back along the road.



And just a couple more photos from the Botanic Gardens, since I'm revisiting it...