The Island - July 2026
In mid-July during the height of the heatwave we made it back to the island.
On the way we picked up enough corrugated to cover the rest of the roof. The island was sweltering hot and the clear roof meant that for a few hours that main room got really hot, not an issue really though as there is plenty of shade outside.
One lesson I seem to need to keep learning is about how much work it is to actually get to the island. I have a tendency to make great plans for work to be done as soon as I arrive without taking into account that I will be wrecked. The amount of loading, unloading and carrying is considerable and everything needs to handled at least a half dozen times before it arrives at its final resting place.
A similar mindset to carrying the shopping into the house, what feels manageable initially, but can quickly become unbearable.
I had expected the growth to be minimal as it hadn’t been that long since our last visit (2 months) and it had been very dry, so I was shocked to see how much the vegetation had shot up.
In the almost 10 years of working on the house there have been two major tasks – controlling the vegetation and rebuilding the roof. The roof is almost done, the house is watertight, but the vegetation is very much an ongoing task.
Obviously the house is only visited sporadically so it will get overgrown if left, but the really issue is that the hedges are very close to the house and the ivy and brambles don’t have to travel far to climb the walls and get under the roof. It was the ivy that the caused the roof to collapse last time.
Over the years we have put in serious effort cutting back the trees and vegetation, but the island is so fertile that it isn’t long growing back. And recently it has been neglected in favour of the roof, so with that in mind the plan changed, for this weekend the focus was to be on cutting back the growth. Not the ideal task for such warm weather.
High tides were late in the evening, so no ideal for cooling down, but the water in the bay will still incredibly warm at sunset.
Ultimately, we made some good progress on one side of the house, but there is still plenty of do before it could be considered under control. We won a minor skirmish, but not the battle, and the war will go on forever.
I suppose there is something heartening in the fact that nature is firmly in the driving seat on the island, there can’t be many places in Ireland where that is the case.
It was a wonderful trip with great company and nice relaxed vibe, furious bouts of slashhooking interspaced with lots of chilling. I feel like the house is at a point where it is properly comfortable – a relative term, think bothy not hotel.
Often it can be rushed leaving the island, tidying and packing in a hurry with a dropping tide. Embarking can also be tricky, if the wind is blowing anywhere from the west to northeast, it often takes some frantic paddling to get into deep enough water to drop the engine, which inevitably doesn’t start first go.
In contrast the boat journey back to the mainland is often quiet. Usually people are tired, but it’s also the point when thoughts turn back to home and it’s a chance to process the trip, reflect and ease back into the real world.
However, this time the departure was smooth, there wasn’t too much last minute stuff to take care of and the tide was nice and high and the water still. To take advantage we had planned to stop off at the southern end of Canon Island for a quick look around. However, passing the narrow neck of low-lying land that connects the two ends of the island, we decided, on a whim, to see if we could enter the channels that run, fractally, through the marsh.
It was a great call, weaving up the main channel, with the banks at or above our eye-line, was fantastic; suddenly we were transported from a very familiar environment to something that felt radically different, more like the the everglades or a tropical salt-march.
To do something different at the very end and to explore a new place, was a great way to finish the trip. We will definitely be back….
