SUN CITY

THREE women, six kids and enough buttered bread to make chip sandwiches on the beach afterwards. Janet Doyle admitted happily yesterday that the members of her little group were true day trippers.

Less than halfway to Bray on the DART and the kids had stripped down to togs and shorts. Socks were shoved into bags and everyone got a mini chocolate bar, eaten before they had a chance to melt.

"I spy with my little eye," five year old Carl Doyle challenged, something beginning with S."

"Seat" someone suggested. "No, sea," Carl said with a bit of artistic licence, as the train was going past a stone wall at the time. But they let him away with it. It was what everyone on the packed train had on their mind.

A run of good weather, the Summer of `95 revisited and everyone in the city who had the time and the energy seemed to be heading for the beach. To bask rather than swelter.

They were well prepared, with music, paperbacks, towels and all the lotions under the sun in backpacks and sports bags. The only man in a suit in the middle of the carriage looked a little lost amid the cotton and denim, the shorts and baseball caps.

Two men on their way for an afternoon's fishing discussed ways of beating the heat. Loads of pints or loads of showers? The first option helped you sleep better, they agreed.

Then there was a glimpse of the first prone body as the train pulled out of Blackrock. Stretched out on the end of a stone jetty, pinking up nicely. A ripple of excitement went round when the sails of dinghies appeared in Monkstown, and the kids started counting the stops to Bray.

Killiney looked like Torremolinas, sun umbrellas and all. Through a chilly tunnel under the railway spattered with onions from the hot dogs the day trippers were poured onto the sharp sand.

Four teenagers lay back and slathered baby oil on their midriffs as they sang along with Oasis, cranked up loud so the sound was warped.

For other sun worshippers it was a case of trying to burn away the strap marks and neck rings left by T-shirts over the past few days. Swimming was an option only for the very brave and the very young.

A woolly retriever danced on his paws in anticipation as his owner approached the edge of the sea, not even reaching the water by the time the stone he was supposed to fetch had sunk without trace. On the horizon a water skier, his body in the shape of a question mark, was dragged across the almost waveless sea by a speedboat, tottering but not falling.

Up at the top of the beach a shirtless man, brown as a nut, dug out the dead grass "Lovely today isn't it," he said smiling. And it was.

And then the clouds came and it all looked a bit more Irish. Hairbrushes were dragged through salty hair and children wrapped in towels. Three sand castles were studiously mashed back into the beach by the little hands of their maker. And then she threw the lollipop stick flagpoles away in disgust. The families trailed back with one thing on their minds. Ice cream one woman ordered three lollies, "What kind?" they asked in the shop. "The cheapest," she said grimly, while a voice below the counter insisted on "Loopdeloops".

Back on the train and four teenage girls paled and then giggled when it slid to a halt and the man on the tannoy talked about "computer failure outside Connolly". They thought their transistor radio had interfered with the train. "Put it on again and see if he does it," one dared.

Then they got distracted waving to the Spanish boys in Lansdowne Road. "Look at him. Look at him. He's gorgeous," with a few cringing moments as they ran out of things to say in sign language and it seemed the train would never pull away.

Back in the city centre the clouds started to spit down. The powerful smell of ozone as the first drops of rain hit the hot streets almost overwhelmed the bus times. But not quite.