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Displaying items by tag: Knight of Glin

This coming weekend an action-packed programme of events will take place at Foynes Yacht Club

On Saturday, the Glin Castle race will take place, and on Sunday the Cappa race is also pencilled in the the sailing schedule (weather permitting).
The Glin Castle race is an annual event between the hosts, the Royal Western Yacht Club in Kilrush, and Foynes Yacht Club, and this is one of the highlights on the Shannon Estuary's sailing calendar, where it has been raced for quite a considerable amount of years between the two clubs.
The Knight of Glin, Desmond FitzGerald and his family are 'very much in favour' of this event being raced for the forseeable future.
This race will start at Glin Pier with first gun at 11am. The boats will race east to different 'marks' laid on the estuary, and back up to Glin Pier, which will be the finish line.
After the race a prizegiving ceremony will be hosted by the Knight and his family in Glin Castle, this will take place at 5pm approximately.
On Sunday, the Cappa race is scheduled to take place with first gun at 11am from Cooleen Point. Again, this is an annual event for the Cappa Cup, prizegiving will take place after racing in the Galleon Inn, Cappa.
On Sunday last 5 Yachts and 2 Mermaids from Foynes Yacht Club sailed east of Cooleen Point for the annual Cannon Island Mass at 3pm. This Mass was said at 5pm in the ruins of the old Franciscian Abbey, where the public of Kildysart converge on the Clare Island. 5 yachts 2 mermaids
Club racing continues every Wednesday evening with first gun at 7pm sharp. Skippers and crew are asked to be at the marina at 6pm. Please note that buoyancy aids have to be worn by all members.

Published in Shannon Estuary

About Brittany Ferries

In 1967 a farmer from Finistère in Brittany, Alexis Gourvennec, succeeded in bringing together a variety of organisations from the region to embark on an ambitious project: the aim was to open up the region, to improve its infrastructure and to enrich its people by turning to traditional partners such as Ireland and the UK. In 1972 BAI (Brittany-England-Ireland) was born.

The first cross-Channel link was inaugurated in January 1973, when a converted Israeli tank-carrier called Kerisnel left the port of Roscoff for Plymouth carrying trucks loaded with Breton vegetables such as cauliflowers and artichokes. The story, therefore, begins on 2 January 1973, 24 hours after Great Britain's entry into the Common Market (EEC).

From these humble beginnings however, Brittany Ferries as the company was re-named quickly opened up to passenger transport, then became a tour operator.

Today, Brittany Ferries has established itself as the national leader in French maritime transport: an atypical leader, under private ownership, still owned by a Breton agricultural cooperative.

Eighty five percent of the company’s passengers are British.

Key Brittany Ferries figures:

  • Turnover: €202.4 million (compared with €469m in 2019)
  • Investment in three new ships, Galicia plus two new vessels powered by cleaner LNG (liquefied natural gas) arriving in 2022 and 2023
  • Employment: 2,474 seafarers and shore staff (average high/low season)
  • Passengers: 752,102 in 2020 (compared with 2,498,354 in 2019)
  • Freight: 160,377 in 2020 (compared with 201,554 in 2019)
  • Twelve ships operating services that connect France, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain (non-Covid year) across 14 routes
  • Twelve ports in total: Bilbao, Santander, Portsmouth, Poole, Plymouth, Cork, Rosslare, Caen, Cherbourg, Le Havre, Saint-Malo, Roscoff
  • Tourism in Europe: 231,000 unique visitors, staying 2.6 million bed-nights in France in 2020 (compared with 857,000 unique visitors, staying 8,7 million bed-nights in 2019).