But Elle pushed on for another fifty yards until she stopped abruptly on the strand, one arm extended out towards the horizon, the other shading her eyes. ‘Look at that, it’s just like the pirate ship in The Goonies,’ she called back, referring to the swashbuckling adventure movie that they both loved.

A moment later, Penny finally caught up with her. She pushed her wispy fair hair out of her eyes and clasped a hand on her hip, working to knead a stitch out of her side from the exertion. ‘Did we really have to run like that? I think I stepped on a jellyfish or something,’ she complained, but Elle didn’t answer. She was entranced by the sight unfolding in front of her.

Penny followed her sister’s gaze towards the open water where an eighteenth century English Tall Ship, complete with three tall masts and billowing sails, was leisurely making its way south off the Wexford coast. The ship, a true original that had been saved, preserved and recently unveiled to the Irish public, had made a temporary home for itself in the water at their hometown Mulberry Bay, just down the beach from where Elle and Penny’s family ran the local hotel.

Perched high on a hill above a sweeping bay, and overlooking the pretty little seaside town with a huge sugarloaf mountain as backdrop, the Bay Hotel’s coastal location and seafront bedrooms were a perfect haven for tourists. For generations the popular hotel had housed visitors from all over the world, as well as weathered some of the worst of the storms the South East coast had seen.

Some of Elle’s favourite memories growing up there were of dramatic lightning strikes at sea, while she, her family and entranced guests watched from the windows. She knew that the tourists took memories like that home with them, to be taken out and relived when life got too overwhelming.

The hotel was located just a short walk up the coast road from the centre of Mulberry Bay.

There was just one main street in the little coastal town, which led directly to the sandy beach. The street was cobbled with red sandstone and no cars were allowed to drive through, the space being reserved for walking and simply enjoying the pretty little shops and eateries. The lamp posts were old wrought iron style, brightly coloured flower pots hanging from them, in keeping with the town’s tourist heritage status.

Elle knew all the shops in the main street: artisan bakeries boasting homemade bread, charming organic produce shops, little boutiques and craft stores with candles and jewellery made to order: tourist mementoes of time spent at the picturesque seaside town.