Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

Way back whenever, as each wave of COVID seemed to sweep over its predecessor with a power worthy of Aileens herself, the incurable optimists among Ireland's sailors continued to hope that by some miracle we'd have reached a stage on…

Optimism is not a sentiment one associates with the Irish fishing industry at the moment – but Kerry based Dr Kevin Flannery does feel there are some reasons to be cheerful. Flannery, a rare fish expert, former fisheries officer, chair…

This week the welcome sound will be coming to Scribbler. The 25-tonne travel hoist boat lift will be manoeuvred into position beneath her at Castlepoint Boatyard and Scribbler will be carried down Point Road, onto the Crosshaven slipway and lowered…

While there may have been nothing exactly like the current schedule-wrecking Pandemic before, in times past - nationally and internationally - we've come through comparable catastrophes. And enough of previous generations have survived to tell the tale and provide guidance…

When the Arctic walrus nicknamed “Wally” arrived in Kerry’s Valentia and then swam over to Wales, award-winning filmmaker Doug Allan was away working on a feature film in Nepal. However, Allan has heard of such visits before – albeit unusual…

Fishermen from the South West Coast will head for Cork Port on Wednesday to "show and tell the crazy scenario" facing their industry. "We are not being treated fairly by either the EU or the government who are not protecting…

"Sailing is a lifestyle activity which evolves as an expression of a vehicle sport afloat". There you go. So now you know. And please note that it's "lifestyle" and not "lifetime", though the latter also applies. Yet you were thinking…

Tuning in to the rhythms of the reef, singing happy birthday to belugas, how polar bears will smell you before they see you, why sharks get a bad press and how it’s more common for surfers than divers to get…

Schull Sailing Club was founded in the West Cork harbour in 1977. Once a thriving fishing community, like other coastal areas that aspect of the village has diminished, but sailing has continued to develop. However, when Cork County Council didn't…

Time was when the question of whether the 2020-Olympics-in-2021 should or should not be staged would have been described as the Elephant in the Room, suggesting the presence of an imponderable so large and unthinkable that the sanity-seeking majority of…

“A near-collision with a drilling ship, two capsizes, lots of peanut butter and Nutella consumed” was how Jasmine Harrison (21) of North Yorkshire described her successful Atlantic crossing earlier this year. Harrison set a new world record for the youngest…

Tonight is a big night for the Royal Cork at Crosshaven, where the Rear Admiral for Keelboats is looking forward to firing the starting gun again this evening. It's not for racing, but for keelboat training, as a prelude to…

The welcome announcement that the National Yacht Club's biennial 280-mile Dun Laoghaire to Dingle Race 2021 will be going ahead on Wednesday, June 9th, is encouraging. But it should not be seen as a clarion call to get the 2021…

The Aberdeen of the Irish Atlantic rim – that’s the potential future for Shannon Foynes, the State’s second port after Dublin. It faces an exciting future, with ESB’s Moneypoint site in County Clare to be transformed into a green energy…

I've never given much thought to why lifeboats are orange. It just seemed to me to be the right colour to be seen easily at sea. Now I know that it's also a colour that provides reassurance and relief -…

Is Ireland “ocean literate”? Tireless campaigners for better awareness of our impact on our marine environment may not be so sure, but Galway-based scientist Dr Noirín Burke is ever optimistic. Dr Burke is director of education at Galway Atlantaquaria in…