Menu

Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

Displaying items by tag: Aer Lingus Kite Surf Pro

#KITESURFING - Ten days of top-class kitesurfing action kick off today (19 October) on Achill Island at the Aer Lingus Kite Surf Pro.

Some 36 riders from 19 countries have converged on Galway Bay to tackle the cold Atlantic waters in what marks the first time the tour has been hosted in Ireland.

As previously reported on Afloat.ie, current world number one Patri McLaughlin will be looking to retain his tour lead in the coming days, but may face a stiff challenge from local wildcard entrants Ryan Coote and Keith McGewon.

Meanwhile, local female wildcard Jade O'Connor will join a field topped by championship leader Ninja Bichler from Germany.

The contest is the penultimate stop on the KSP World Tour for 2012, and will be streamed live online via the official tour website.

It will operate with a mobile format, with riders based at the Pure Magic Lodge on the island and heading out to whatever spot produces the best possible combination of wind and waves on any given day.

Published in Kitesurfing

Coastal Notes Coastal Notes covers a broad spectrum of stories, events and developments in which some can be quirky and local in nature, while other stories are of national importance and are on-going, but whatever they are about, they need to be told.

Stories can be diverse and they can be influential, albeit some are more subtle than others in nature, while other events can be immediately felt. No more so felt, is firstly to those living along the coastal rim and rural isolated communities. Here the impact poses is increased to those directly linked with the sea, where daily lives are made from earning an income ashore and within coastal waters.

The topics in Coastal Notes can also be about the rare finding of sea-life creatures, a historic shipwreck lost to the passage of time and which has yet many a secret to tell. A trawler's net caught hauling more than fish but cannon balls dating to the Napoleonic era.

Also focusing the attention of Coastal Notes, are the maritime museums which are of national importance to maintaining access and knowledge of historical exhibits for future generations.

Equally to keep an eye on the present day, with activities of existing and planned projects in the pipeline from the wind and wave renewables sector and those of the energy exploration industry.

In addition Coastal Notes has many more angles to cover, be it the weekend boat leisure user taking a sedate cruise off a long straight beach on the coast beach and making a friend with a feathered companion along the way.

In complete contrast is to those who harvest the sea, using small boats based in harbours where infrastructure and safety poses an issue, before they set off to ply their trade at the foot of our highest sea cliffs along the rugged wild western seaboard.

It's all there, as Coastal Notes tells the stories that are arguably as varied to the environment from which they came from and indeed which shape people's interaction with the surrounding environment that is the natural world and our relationship with the sea.