Lesley Bond: Life on the Great Blasket
About this episode
Lesley Bond shares her experiences of living as a caretaker on the Great Blasket Island, discussing the challenges and joys of island life without modern comforts.
Topics covered: island life, living without modern comforts, heritage, community, postnatal depression, writing and healing. This week, I’m joined by public historian and author Lesley Bond. In 2019, Lesley and her then-boyfriend, (now husband) Gordon, left their busy lives behind to spend six months as caretakers on the Great Blasket Island, off the coast of Kerry. With no electricity or hot water, their days were shaped by the rhythms of the island and the unpredictability of the Atlantic. Together, they welcomed visitors from all over the world, ran the island café, looked after the guest cottages and became part of a small but special seasonal community. The Great Blasket was once home to a thriving Irish-speaking community and became renowned for its extraordinary literary tradition. The final residents left the island in 1953, but its stories, language and heritage live on. Lesley brings us behind the scenes of life as an island caretaker...from the practical realities of running a café without electricity and carrying out the daily housekeeping, to wild weather and the unexpected joy of sleeping more deeply than she ever had before. She also reflects on what it felt…
More episodes of Ready To Be Real by Síle Seoige
- Zoe Holohan : Honeymoon tragedy (revisit)
- The true cost of cheap food : Kenneth Keavey, Green Earth Organics
- Great Blasket island : Real Take
- Helen Ogbu : Community is everything
- Bardic storytelling with Aindrias de Staic
- Aindrias de Staic : The Wildness Within
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