Curious Threads
Dollymount to Sorrento Danielle O’Leary
She grew up by the Irish Sea. Dollymount Strand is a 5-kilometre beach that floats on its own island, North Bull Island. To get to that beach, she had to stroll 400 metres from her childhood home, crossing Clontarf Road, and walk across the Wooden Bridge that was built in 1819. A port is to the right, which opens out into Dublin Bay, the Irish Sea. The sun rises over this sea. The moments in and around the sea punctuated her childhood. She slowly walked across that high, unsteady bridge with courage as her parents balanced her steps. When she married, her husband said he wanted to move to Australia. ‘I’ll go if we live by the beach,’ she told him. He promised that they would. In 1982, she first flew over Indian Ocean, en-route to Perth. They landed on July 4, and went to the beach the next day. The winter weather was perfect – a bright sunny day, 17 degrees. No one was around. Is this paradise, she thought? She now lives by the Indian Ocean. Sorrento Beach is a 600-metre beach that is shaped with man-made stone walls. To get to that beach, she strolls 280 metres from her home, crossing West Coast Drive and walks along a wooden deck that curves 89
