This is a RSS file. Copy the URL into your aggregator of choice. If you don't know what this means and want to learn more, please see: http://platial.typepad.com/news/2006/04/really_simple_t.html for more info. http://www.platial.comhttp://www.platial.com/map/Sea-kayaks-and-camping/51994 Some of my special places around Ireland : feel free to add yours. Photos with sea kayak and tent or campsite preferred. http://www.platial.com/post/2041501
The Baidarka Explorer was designed by Derek Hutchinson. It has a very pronounced V–shaped hull and as it has a cutter bow and stern the keel extends the whole length of the waterline. This coupled with its Swedish form makes it quite a fast boat. The turned up bits on the bow and stern are Hutchinson’s interpretation of the bifurcated bows on the skin boats of the Aleutian Islands (it's Russian for 'little boat').
expedition boat designed to carry large loads. It’s very good at going from A to B in as straight a line as possible but it's not very manoeuvrable: even when edged right over in a high brace turn it doesn’t turn quickly. When loaded that deep V keel is pushed down into the water and the soft chines give it very good secondary stability. When cranked over there’s a positive feel to edging. But when empty it rides higher in the water so you’re sitting on that V shape which makes it very twitchy and the positive feel of the chines disappears. The high peak on the fore deck makes it a very easy boat to roll. This is an old design now there are more modern expedition boats around that will carry as much, are just as fast, more manoeuvrable and better behaved when empty.
But they don't look so weirdly wonderful.
I bought mine second-hand in Anglesey, and carried it back on the ferry to Dublin. Customs didn't know what to make of it: I had it slung on my shoulder and said it was hand-luggage. It's made of kevlar/carbon, super-light compared to plastic boats and is near-indestructible.
It's 20 years old this year - about a third of my age - and I want to be pushed out to sea in it when I'm dead.

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]]> 2007-09-05 09:15:48.741299+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2041510 2007-09-04 05:46:22.128643+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2041530
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]]> 2007-09-04 05:20:41.754789+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2049069 The Skeams are troubling places: Skeam West has a modern storm-proofed house, sheltered jetty and a fuckoff-this-is-private-property air to it. East Skeam is delightful, with white sand beaches, trees and a couple of ruined cottages.
The last time I landed on West Skeam more development had taken place - what looked like preparations for a short landing-strip: old stone walls removed,fields bulldozed flat, - and enough oil reserve tanks to last a nuclear winter... There was a rumour that millionaire Lateral Thinker Edward de Bono had bought it; and indeed it became one of his Centres for New Thinking, from '96 - '01, when it went on sale again for £1 million. New owner: a mystery to me and Google. A great guide to the islands of Ireland: www.oileain.org/oileain

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]]> 2007-09-05 07:41:56.574659+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2041518 2007-09-04 05:02:56.350294+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2041524
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]]> 2007-09-04 05:13:58.038372+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2049001 Sixty grey seals slaughtered on Blaskets 05-11-04

'About 60 grey seals have been culled on one of the Blasket Islands off the coast of Co Kerry. The Irish Seal Sanctuary blamed local fishermen for the slaughter of the seals. "There's only one direction the finger can be pointed at: the fishing community," said group spokesman Mr Sean Eviston, who travelled to Beginish Island off the coast of the Dingle peninsula to confirm reports of the cull. Mr Eviston said the grey seals killed were mostly "whitecoats," pups about three weeks old. He said the attackers appeared to have used several methods to kill, including gun shots, beating the animals with rocks, and driving nails into their skulls. "They ripped some of these seals open from the nape of the neck," he said. Gardaí are investigating.he Minister for the Environment, Mr Dick Roche, described the slaughter of the seals as "cruel and barbaric". He has sent a department official to the islands to investigate. The cruel and barbaric slaughter of these seals has a de-humanising effect on society. The sight of seals being bludgeoned to death is repugnant," mr Roche said. ishermen have been blamed for occasional slaughters of seals on the islands that dot the western and southern coasts of Ireland. Nobody has ever faced charges. rey seals are supposed to be a protected species under Ireland's Wildlife Act of 1976. Beginish is part of the Blasket Islands, Ireland's largest sanctuary for grey seals. The Irish Seal Sanctuary estimates that fewer than 400 grey seals are resident in the islands, down from about 2,000 a half-century ago.'

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]]> 2007-09-08 14:21:32.092026+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2049092
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]]> 2007-09-06 01:08:11.603942+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2049060 You'd have to be a wuss, and a fair-weather paddler to like this kind of easy paddle & camp. But paddling/kayaking/canoeing is the way to get just that bit away from MainLandStuff - knowing that no others would be able to sneak in to the coves & beaches you find.

There are extaordinary kayakers out there - circumnavigating Ireland, the British Isles and further and wider ... but that's not me.
What I'm looking for here on Platial are your hidden coves and bays and beaches, where you've camped and cooked and paddled.

www.oileain.org Here is David Walsh writing in Oileáin (an evolving guide to the Irish islands): Rabbit Island East: 'Really a pair of giant stacks detached from Rabbit Island. It is possible to get through the channels except at LW. The stach nearer Rabbit is climbable in the E side with care. The larger taller steeper stack farther from Rabbit will be too dangerous a grassy scramble for most tastes. Rabbit Island: 'This pleasant, formerly inhabited island is the mainstay of this group and very much worthy of a camping stopover. he best landing place is halfway along the N coast, on a sheltered pebble beach under a ruined house. There is sheltered camping beside the house, but no water was found. The island is waisted N/S at this point, and camping may also be had on the other, S side of the waist, also from a pebble beach, for that 'oceanic feel' and also at any number of other pebble beaches on this much-fragmented, attractive island, which is well worth pottering around, on foot or afloat. This island is privately owned (1997) by an owner who would prefer exclusive use of the S facing beach referred to above for picnics and boat, but otherwise would allow well behaved visitors to use the rest of the island in passing. There are wild horses, burrows, Chough and Linnet on the island. Otter were seen on the W side and at the Stack of Beans on the E side.' Some years back, that new owner turned up for the first time and caught me by surprise: up 'til then I had thought the exclusive use of the place, including that 'oceanic feel', was mine. How could someone 'own' this uninhabited island? How could he own 'my island'? I broke camp and left in a rage - which was only slighly moderated later that summer, when I cruised past and spotted them skinny-dipping - as I had done before. He was putting his exclusivity to some good use, at least.

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]]> 2007-09-06 06:31:43.304434+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2041532 www.oileain.org/recex.htm

The first time I landed there - some time before this was written - there were two goats, the big old puck and a female. The next summer - just the puck, and a whitened skeleton with a drumskin of brittle hide stretched over the ribs. Low island was eroding rapidly too: the 'waist' of sandy soil between the two beaches was much reduced and there may be little remaining to camp on by now.

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]]> 2007-09-06 03:44:56.635407+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2049003
The weather had seemed set fair for the long weekend, but lobstermen off Inishnabro warned of a rapid change. As David Walsh says in Oileáin (an evolving guide to the Irish islands): "There is little in the way of anchorages for bigger boats at the outliers, which are also rugged and exposed. Therefore, sea kayakers are privileged to have the finest way to explore the group as a whole. he Blaskets are a showpiece of Irish sea kayaking. That said, among the outliers, only Beginish and Inishvickillane have landings that are in any way dependable. Good conditions are needed elsewhere to avoid having to swim ashore, or worse. Expect to have to work for any landing." There was just time to land and piss on Inishvickillane, Haughy's private island and rush back to break camp on Beginish. Crossing Blasket Sound before the squalls hit was fearful: the tide races in the sounds, including Blasket Sound, have a fierce reputation. A zone the size of a rugby pitch was oily flat amid the chop - and seemed a foot lower. The short route was across but I chose to fight a track around the outside. Big waves were pounding Coumeenole strand, but the heavily-laden Baidarka surfed in straight. I'll learn to roll before going there again - and not go alone. www.oileain.org

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]]> 2007-09-05 22:37:19.807745+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2049065 2007-09-06 05:07:14.68708+00:00 http://www.platial.com/post/2049244 I'm a fair-weather paddler as you can see. This was a close-call three-day trip: where the weather was crucial but the forecast ... not quite as committed as I'd have liked. Rather than trespass on this benign somnolence, I decided to creep timorously down the exposed atlantic side of Great Blasket, to explore Inishvickillane and Inishnabo. Nearly my undoing (see Blaskets).

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