This was not where we intended to walk today... The forecast seemed good, and we'd lined up a really interesting circuit round the Sloc. But the day dawned quite different from what we'd expected. Not bright and sunny, as promised, but gloomy and threatening rain, with low cloud hanging over at least 20 per cent of our projected route.

So, as has happened before, we headed for the lowlands. A little circuit around Balladoole and Castletown would fit the bill, we thought -- out through the fields, back along the coast, coffee in the middle.

Then Nigel realized he hadn't brought his walking boots anyway... I'm not criticizing. We're both a bit scatterbrained at the moment. I shed gloves at regular intervals, and have to retrace sizeable stretches of my route to hunt them down again. We're not entirely on top of the various sets of equipment required for different grades of walks (remember the only question we normally need to answer is whether or not it's raining...).

I think what we actually need is a trained caddy...

Anyway, our next requirement was a walk that could be done just wearing shoes, and the Marine Drive seemed perfect.


This route, which runs from Douglas Head to Port Soderick, has been through a number of iterations.

It was originally the route of the Douglas Southern Electric Railway, which operated from 1896 to 1939.

Then, in the 1950s, the powers-that-be began work to convert it into a road. The heavy-duty engineering elements kicked off in 1960, and the new Marine Drive was officially opened in May 1962. So I would have been four, and for many years, a ride along the Marine Drive was one of the Island highlights Dad used to show to family visitors. It was indeed an exciting drive, with towering cliffs, and plunging views down into the ocean, and the constant fear of "rock falls".

Sadly, it didn't last long. It was closed in 1977 on account of the collapse of a section of the roadway.

(You can find pictures of various stages of this history here.)

There are definite payoffs to the current no-cars condition, though. You can drive a little way at either end, but then there's a whole section that is used only by walkers and cyclists. It's a paved road, so it's ideal for inclement weather, and the coastal scenery is much better appreciated if you're not in a car.

We parked by the imposing gateway near Douglas Head, walked not quite as far as Port Soderick, ate our sandwiches, and then went back the same way.

It was a very blowy day, so the sea was quite dramatic:






The other thing that's really interesting about the Marine Drive is its geology.

Example: "The rocks on Marine Drive consist of up-ended and folded layers of sandstone and mudstone which were originally laid down on the bed of a deep ocean, thousands of kilometres south of the equator. How they and similar rocks came to form the present day Isle of Man is a story involving almost half a billion years of the Earth’s geological history."

Like, wow...

The ocean was called Iapetus, and it lay between Gondwanaland (centred on the south pole) and Laurentia (north of the Equator). The process of plate tectonics saw Gondwanaland colliding with Laurentia about 410 million years ago, shrinking Iapetus right down to nothing in the process.

But the pushing, shoving, jostling business didn't finish there. The newly fused continents drifted north, but then about 60 million years ago, the continent divided to form the Atlantic Ocean: "This tectonic upheaval caused the whole Irish Sea region to rise another 1-2 kilometers as the weight of America was unshackled. This uplift caused rivers to downcut again, resulting in the Manx glens. Also the tall cliffs along the coast, including Marine Drive, partly owe their origin to this upheaval."

Which is fascinating. But even if you don't know all that, the convoluted rock shapes are awe-inspiring. You only have to think of the forces involved to do that kind of thing with ROCK...





It's Monday today, and a LOT of cafes are closed on Mondays. But here's one that's not, and is handily close to our current home:






On the way home we stopped to buy apples from the orchard next door. I must admit I'm loving being able to buy varieties such as King of the Pippins, Opalescent, Norfolk Royal, and Lord Lambourne. You don't see things like this in the shops, and they're really delicious.

As it turned out, it's a good thing we made our apple purchases quickly, because the timing meant we were inside Rose Cottage when this happened:


We always reverse into our drive, because we're on a blind bend, and you don't want to be reversing OUT. The spot on the left-hand carriageway where the tree landed is EXACTLY where we'd stopped, just minutes earlier, before backing in... So there were just a few minutes in it. Just a few utterly coincidental minutes. Always a sobering thought.

Truly, nothing in life is predictable.

Our neighbour saw the fall as a free wood bonanza (as indeed my dad would have done). It's an ill wind...

I felt sorry for the tree, though. I'm always sad when trees fall.