into the blue

Last weekend, I had the rare chance to get away and a wonderfully generous family at Fitzroy offered me their holiday home to escape to in Castlerock. I hopped on the train wielding my tea and cinnamon roll and excitedly prepared to get away from it all on the beach. I sat next to a very friendly, very chatty older woman named Lily, and we (well, her really) talked most of the way there. Before I knew it, Iwas lugging my bag off of the train and looking around at a quaint, sunlit beach community.

The very modern house I was staying in was just a short walk away and I quickly fell in love with the personality and simplicity of Castlerock. I bought eggs and bacon from the "village butcher" (that's his official name), warm homemade wheaten bread from the bakery and a few other things from the only grocery store in town--all right within walking distance. My friend Suzie was nearby visiting her parents and so she came up on Saturday in her mini convertable and we walked the beach, drove around a bit and had coffee in the coffee shop (yup, the only one in town). I expected myself to hibernate in the amazing house and cook, sleep and spend a couple of days in my pj's, but having the beach just a 10-minute walk away was too tempting.

The sun shone brightly the whole time, and I had my very own spot in the dunes (you can walk in them here) to read and watch the waves every day. The sky was, like described once in Harry Potter, "so blue that it looked like it had been enamelled." I drank my morning coffee on the beach, walked along cliff edges (gulp!), had homemade ice cream and read Harry Potter and Buechner on the beach during the day, then hibernated as soon as the warming sun went down at night by cooking and watching Harry Potter (bit of a theme here) and Stardust. It was refueling, refreshing, re-creating. What a wonderful time!