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Displaying items by tag: Pilgrim Way

A series of consultative workshops on the feasibility of an iconic Pilgrim Way between the Shannon Navigation and Erne System took place earlier this month.

In late 2018, West Limerick Resources in partnership with Waterways Ireland and 13 local development companies (LDCs) and associated local authorities commissioned SLR Consulting and Alan Hill Tourism Development to investigate the feasibility of developing a 350km cross-border Pilgrim Way along the inland waterways.

The area under consideration is a 20km-wide corridor which uncovers a unique and vast pilgrim heritage on and along the inland waterways, from the Shannon estuary in Co Kerry northwards through the Shannon Navigation, Shannon-Erne Waterway, and Erne System in Co Fermanagh to Co Donegal.

The aim is to develop an iconic international ‘Pilgrim Way’ based on the rich early Christian and Viking heritage of the Early Medieval period in Ireland.

Well known ecclesiastical sites include Scattery Island, Iniscealtra (Holy Island, Clare), Clonmacnoise (Offaly), Quaker Island (Lough Ree), Boyle Abbey (Roscommon), Devenish Island (Lough Erne) and the iconic pilgrimage site at Lough Derg (St Patrick’s) in Donegal, among others.

Many more, lesser known sites are included in the overall analysis for a total of more than 100 sites in total. Waterways Ireland has more information about the project.

Published in Inland Waterways

New York Yacht Club’s biennial Invitational Cup

Ireland has a proud history in New York Yacht Club’s biennial Invitational Cup, with Irish participation from the very start and a podium result in 2019.

In 2009, two Irish Clubs,  Royal St. George in Dun Laoghaire and Royal Cork in Crosshaven, entered into New York's newest sailing competition that was reminiscent of Newport’s America’s Cup days when 19 yacht club teams from 14 nations descended on this “City by the Sea”.

The Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup is a competition between yacht clubs, with strict eligibility rules ensuring that each team is comprised exclusively of amateur sailors.

The competition, which was first run in 2009, has drawn entries from 49 clubs from 22 nations on all six inhabited continents.

The New York Yacht Club won the inaugural event in 2009, with the Royal Canadian Yacht Club winning in 2011 and 2013, England's Royal Thames Yacht Club winning in 2015 and Southern Yacht Club from New Orleans winning in 2017.

In 2019 the regatta was sailed for the first time in the New York Yacht Club’s fleet of IC37 yachts, and Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, from Australia, became the first Southern Hemisphere club to win the trophy. And it was in this edition that Anthony O’Leary’s Royal Cork team took the bronze medal.