Heartbeat: The highest authority dragged me out at some ungodly hour to walk from the Pigeon House to the Poolbeg lighthouse at the end of the South Bull Wall of Dublin port.

It was a glorious morning, save a brisk cold southeasterly chopping up the waters at the entrance to the river and in the wider bay beyond.

I preach ‘three miles a day’, and I do try to practise it. On this walk I scarcely noticed the distance or the time.
The red lighthouse, so familiar to Dubliners, was started in 1761 and first shed light on the waters six years later. In those days, cockles, shrimp and oysters were indigenous and formed a major part of the bill of fare of adjacent hostelries like The Good Woman or The Conniving House in Irishtown and Ringsend.

As a child swimming at Booterstown or Williamstown, I was always warned about the dangers of the cockle lake, supposed to lie in the vague vicinity of Irishtown. According to my mother, about half the population of Ireland had drowned in it, mostly careless and disobedient youths like me.

You would be a brave soul to trust the marine harvest of the bay in these times. I suppose that when the Pembroke main drain began to discharge raw, untreated sewage into the mouth of the Liffey, it was all over for the seafood aficionados, at least as regards produce from the immediate vicinity.

At the lighthouse you appear to be in the middle of the bay with the surrounding coast spread all around you: Howth to the north, the ever-changing skyline of the city behind, and Dún Laoghaire, Killiney and the Dublin hills to the south and west.

Turning our backs to the breeze and heading back towards the city we met two men about to swim at the Half Moon Swimming Club at the battery.

One told me that a colleague had performed a coronary bypass upon him some six years previously and that he had never felt better. He swam every day, barring gale and storm.

Looking at the choppy, uninviting sea I knew I couldn’t have done it, whatever the health benefits. My little walk would have to suffice, but a vague feeling of discontent stirred deep within in the presence of such dedication.

My begrudging mind recalled the story of the psychiatric patient who absconded from a hospital in Cavan, stark naked, in a snowstorm. A hastily-gathered posse of gardaí and psychiatric nurses set off in pursuit, into the falling snow and gathering darkness.
They followed the bare footprints, fading in the falling snow, with no success. Eventually a Garda said “there’s someone coming”, and a wobbling bicycle light appeared out of the gloom with a hunched figure pedalling laboriously.

“Is that yourself, Patsy?” called the guard.
“It is surely,” came the reply.
“Terrible night to be abroad,” said the Garda.
“It is surely,” came the verbose answer.
“Did you happen to see a mon (sic) heading down the road a whiles back?” asked the Garda.
“I did surely.”
“Did ye notice he’d no clothes on?”
“I did surely.”
“Did ye not think that was passing remarkable?”
“I did surely.”
“Did ye say anything to him, Patsy?” asked the Garda.
“I did surely.”
“What did you say, Patsy?” came the next question.
“Hardy mon, sez I.”
“Good night to yez all.”
I salute the hardy men of the Half Moon.

A lovely walk indeed but it has one unfortunate feature: the flagstones are very uneven and require that you mind your step. This militates to some degree against your enjoyment of the panoramic views.
It is a small price to pay.

There is another little problem- right at the commencement of the walk, beside the car park at Irishtown Nature Park, there is now a Traveller halting site. It is not an official site, nor is it serviced.

Accordingly, it presents the kind of problems of which we are all too well aware. Maybe Minister for the Environment John Gormley can do something to provide proper facilities for these folk who are located in his constituency. They have to have somewhere to live in decency with proper facilities, not in squalor by the roadside.

While he’s at it, maybe he can fix the smell from the sewage works and do a job on the incinerator as well. His constituents would probably rather that than everlasting light bulbs.

Main picture: The Poolbeg Lighthouse and above The Half Moon Swimming Club.

Maurice Neligan is a cardiac surgeon. This article was originally published in ‘The Irish Times’.