In our house, Midsummer is Manannán and Fand’s Day, and for the past few years (since we gave them the day officially in our Household Religious Calendar) I’ve been wanting to go to the beach for the closest weekend to it… but alas, this year we once again couldn’t make that work out. The closest actual bit of the ocean is about a 3.5 hour drive, and with a 1yo who hates care rides and two busy weekends, it just didn’t happen.
Instead, we went to a riverside park, hoping that would be acceptable. When we got there, we saw a heron at the end of the dock, who remained there the entire time we did, even when we threw the apples into the water as an offering. I’m pretty sure that means it was acceptable!
After spending some time next to the water, we wandered off in search of a restaurant for dinner, and found a neat little nautical themed bistro. I had fish tacos, which were super tasty! I didn’t have a prayer prepared, but we nodded a bit to Manannán and Fand and had a little holiday dinner. Afterwards, we went for ice cream, and then walked back to the park. The heron had left, and the apples were nowhere to be seen, so we headed back to the car and drove home. Not very flashy, but it was comfortable, and I’d be happy to make visiting that park a new family tradition. Though one of these years we are definitely going to make it to the beach…