Dolphin Address 22
October 4, 2004
Had I not been there myself, I would not have recognized Pollenawatch. Not only was it totally submerged, the shape and movement of the waves was of total other signature. The sea's ever changing grip defines the access to the dolphin, but only now I could envision the cruel forces that originated the nearly overhanging cliffs.
Where in summer days the water would whisper by the rounded rocks, now it was shredded and torn by sharp and fractured stones on a commanding level. Violence too random and brutal to describe.
Not the rain, nor the loose boulders, but the mud that is taken and left quadrupled by the number of visitors on the trip track that connects Pollenawatch to the through road makes dare-devils of us all.
This Coast Road with all its bends and oncoming traffic is not the ideal gallery to venerate the sea. Yet it provides ever changing variations on this theme. In this storm my breath was halted when I saw the beach. Contrary to tradition, the waves were not storming over the sand. They were gathering momentum and at the shutter glance of my spotting eye seemed to be standing still. Just in time I could swerve two poncho draped subjects of the pedaling persuasion.
The road wound on and far above the sea I could detect a break in the sky. It ionized rapidly into a salty cloud of crystallized light. The snow white crest of the toppling waves caught it. At Black Head, grey as any other patch of rock but christened so by contrast, they turned orange! I swung the car into the tourist haven and dived in the glove compartment for my camera. I might as well have driven on as the magic was gone even before I realized I left my third eye at home.
Just after Black Head the road bends in with the mountain where it is at its steepest. It is an air chute that materializes on the waves calming down from the ocean. Usually there are outlandish patterns drawn by falling winds, but now scores of whirlwinds drew spinning curtains from the surface and raced them criss-cross to extinction.
When I reached Ballyvaughan the water was pushed up so high, the village seemed under siege. Seagulls bobbed on waves slackened by seaweed. But I went on because we live on the other side, on a foothill of mount Moreen.
It never rains but it pours, but seldom longer than for half hours, alternated by a generous shot of sunshine. By any other dream I would have arrived in Rainbow Land. A magpie flik-flaks its wings in airwolf mode over the meadow and a single crow catches the sunlight against a thunder cloud. 'Killohill' sounds like an odd invitation to a mountain walk. I accept, but I let my eyes travel before me.
Jan Ploeg, Killohill, October 4th 2004
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