Stats so far: 17 days – 307 nautical miles – 14 paddling days
Wildlife – dolphins, gannets, minke whale, puffins, shearwaters, guillemots.. many other birds
Islands visited – Sherkin, Deenish, the Skelligs, Great Blasket
What a place! Ireland is wilder and more beautiful than I realised. I knew there were some special areas here but every day of the paddle so far has been pretty with endless camping possibilities & a myriad of beautiful offshore islands to explore. Most days we’ve passed cliffs, caves, arches & rugged headlands, often with flocks of birds cruising overhead or diving in the water around us.
My favourite day so far was crossing 12 miles from Deenish island to the infamous Skellig islands. Thick cloud shrouded the islands when we set off so we paddled into the murk, until slowly 2 improbable spires appeared through the white. As we got closer hundreds of gannets came floating towards us in the sky, out fishing from their colony on Little Skellig, pausing above us with a flutter of white wings to check us out. Dozens of clownlike puffins also appeared, clumsily flapping their stubby wings in their search for food. We reached the jetty on Great Skellig after about 4 hours – just as all the tour boats arrived with dozens of tourists. I managed to land in between ships and the others looked after my kayak while I rushed up the steep steps to the impressive beehive huts at the top of the rock – that were built by monks hundreds of years ago. It must have been a harsh life on this tiny island, but the huts have stood the test of time and the countless storms that must have raged over them. Thousands of puffins now nest here and they seemed non-pulsed by the steady stream of tourists pointing their cameras at them (me included).
The tour boat captains warned us of a forecast change – a gale was now due that evening so we rushed away from the magnificent Skelligs and headed due north- making the most of a following wind and sea. Our destination was another beautiful island – Great Blasket 20 miles distant. As soon as a squall passed, we could see it’s two humps which gradually got bigger. Barry was feeling low on energy on his 6th day with diarrhea but he still stayed at the front most of the way there. He was struggling to eat and barely showed a smile when a pod of dolphins appeared alongside us. After another 5 hours we pulled up at the small pier there, carrying the kayaks up some steep rocky steps, before pitching our tents inside the ruins of some abandoned houses to shelter from the approaching gale. This beautiful island has a special feel to it which is hard to explain – it’s added to by the hundreds of seals lounging on the golden sandy beach, the tidal race guarding the island on the NE end, the pretty curve of the ridge line, the outlying small islands & the stoney remnants of a once busy village which was abandoned in the the 1950s.
We were joined on this day – and the previous day by James Allitt from Norfolk who paddling into the same campsite as us near Crookhaven. He’s paddling around as much of Ireland as he can in 6 weeks and it was fun to spend a couple of days with him. We left him enjoying Great Blasket yesterday as we headed East around Sybil head with a strong Westerly pushing us along. A 3-4 metre swell and an opposing tide kicked up a much more exciting sea than we’d expected. It was exhilarating and a bit gripping. We decided against another 10 mile paddle along some cliffs with an increasing forecast and landed after 10 miles at a small pier in the sheltered Smerwick harbour. Once the tents were up and we’d had lunch I checked my phone to find a message from Noel O’Leary from Irish Adventures offering us a ride to his place near Dingle & a bed for the night. We happily took the tents down, cleared up and took him up on his offer. Last night we enjoyed a pub meal and some live music – today is a NW wind force 5-6 so we are sheltering from the showers and gusts in Noel’s house & I’m able to borrow a computer to write this blog – and update the previous ones which were tricky to do on my phone. Later today we’ll go out with Noel to kayak with Fungi the famous friendly Dingle dolphin which I’m really looking forward to! Noel also runs Dingle Adventure Race every year, which looks like a fun event.
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