Biddy’s rocky beach can be found just to the left of the Good Luck pier in Ballyyahoo.
It follows the coast along a rugged shoreline.
That same shoreline stretches and winds along the coast of the Wild Atlantic Way and ends up in the ocean.
You can only get to Biddy’s beach by making your way through the narrow trail that the sheep and cows make when they trample through the fields.
After that you cross a small meadow and there it is.
Biddy’s beach is filled with rocks and jutting out boulders.
Sadly for the bucket-and-spaders there are only a few small patches of sand.
But, even the patches of sand have stones in.
So it’s not a great beach for bucketing, spading, or sitting. The best beach for that is The Halfamoon Beach.
You can see just how rocky it is in this picture below.
Some of the rocks are big enough to make walls.
Ballyyahooian farmers make lots of stone walls and those walls stop the sheep and cows from getting too near the sea.
You’re probably wondering why it’s called Biddy’s beach.
Well, it always was and will be called Biddy’s beach, probably because Biddy spends a lot of time there.
WITCH STONES
The Ballyyahooians don’t know quite what Biddy does there.
Some say she goes there to collect magic stones.
These are small, 
round, grey stones with holes in, often called Witch Stones.
Some of them also say that Biddy is no ordinary Ballyyahooian and that Biddy is really a witch.
Biddy denies that she either is, or could be, The Witch of Ballyyahoo.
The last person that dared to ask her if she is a witch was rewarded with a sharp slap in the chops with a smoked kipper.
So nobody dared again.
MUST BE MAGIC?
Whatever the truth of the matter is, there are millions of rocks and stones on Biddy’s beach.
So, surely there might be a chance that even one, or even two of them, might just be magic?.
PADDY PLANT
Paddy Plant, Ballyyahoo’s oldest and boldest resident, thinks stories about witch stones are a load of old bog-nonsense.
Paddy spends quite a bit of time on Biddy’s rocky beach because one of his favourite hobbies is catching crabs.
CATCHING CRABS AND OTHER TALL STORIES
The crevices between the rocks fill with water when the tide is in and the seaweed makes them too slippery to walk on.
But when the tide is out this is a great place for catching crabs.
Paddy, like many a Ballyyahooian, likes to tell the odd tall story.
He says he has been catching crabs on Biddy’s beach for ninety-four years.
According to Paddy, so was his father before him, and his mother before him, and his father before him, and his mother before him, and so on and so on, backwards til he gets to the year dot.
CONTRARINESS AND OTHER OCCUPATIONS
Paddy can be a bit contrary now again, so no Ballyyahooian would argue with this.
They’re all terrified of being chased down the lanes of Ballyyahoo by Paddy and his rusty pitch fork.
Paddy’s great with a pitch fork!
Biddy, who can more than match Paddy for contrariness, depending on which way the moon is shining, also has a tall story to tell.
She says she’s been catching crabs there for ninety four thousand years.
Even though she doesn’t have a pitchfork, nobody would dare argue with Biddy either. Except Maggie Many Cats, but nobody listens to her, except of course her cats.
Maggie’s cats are not afraid to argue at all – which ever way the moon is shining.
For more stories from Ballyyahoo click here.
Ballyyahoo – encouraging children to love nature.
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