Standing on the deserted blustery beach, we are accompanied by squadrons of ghost children in Edwardian costumes splashing and racing and gathering sea-shells, and elegant ladies bathing in long-leggèd costumes. Look, Leah, there’s Ailsa Craig, and behind it, Ireland, can you see? We’re not far.

Now, there are some folk who say that Ailsa was dropped there by the same witches who were chasing Tam O’Shanter. They didn’t get Tam, only poor Meg’s tail, when she was leaping over the burn to safety (because witches can't cross running water, you know). Some say the devil sent them on to Ireland next, stealing off with some of Scotland’s treasure, but one of the witches let go of her skirts and the precious stone she was carrying landed in the sea and became our Ailsa Craig. Ach, but that's not the real story of how Ailsa Craig came to be Paddy’s milestone (now it marks the distance to Scotland for Irish fisherman, you see?).

Long long ago, before our time, before the time of Tam O’ Shanter, Finn MacCuill was the leader of the Fianna, the King of Ireland’s warriors, and the defender of Ulster. He was a magical man and a good man; a giant, no one was better at poetry or wisdom than Finn. One of his rivals was Benandonner, a Scottish giant who lived just across the sea, here in Ayrshire. Benandonner couldn’t swim across the sea to Ireland for a proper giant’s battle, so Finn tore pieces of rock from Volcanoes into columns to make the causeway to Scotland...the Giant's Causeway. Benandonner came across the causeway to Ireland to Finn's house, but Finn had dressed up as a baby to confuse him. My goodness! thought Benandonner, if the baby is this big, how big must his father be? Suddenly, the baby Finn bit the Scottish giant's hand off and Benandonner took off for Scotland, in a great stramash. When he saw that Benandonner was running away, Finn decided to give him something else for good measure. He picked up wads of Irish earth and started throwing them after poor auld Benandonner. The largest hole that he left behind, that's Lough Neagh (that big lake in the North of Ireland) and one large clump of dirt he threw became the Isle of Man. But the last rock that Finn threw fell short: it landed in the sea near Girvan, and that’s Ailsa Craig that you’re looking at now.

One summer, I spent hours writing poems in the flat sand left behind by the tide, convinced by Gran that the waves would carry my writing to children on Irish beaches.