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Displaying items by tag: Monaghan

Co Monaghan is hosting “the Olympics of angling” this weekend (Saturday 22 and Sunday 23 April) with the World Feeder Club Championships, as RTÉ News reports.

Lough Muckno is the venue for 28 teams representing 18 countries who will fish for the top prize in the competition hosted by the National Coarse Fishing Federation of Ireland (NCFFI).

Local anglers in the Cavan Monaghan Lakelands Feeder Club are joined by one other Irish team from Lurgan Coarse Angling Club in the international field that’s already been a hospitality boon for Castleblayney and environs.

RTÉ News has much more on the story HERE.

Published in Angling

One opportunistic Wakerboarder made the most of the floods at the traffic lights in Monaghan town. The high speed water dash was captured by Facebooker Eveyln Boylan and has been shared over 30,000 times since posting on December 30!

Published in Waterskiing
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#ANGLING - A prize pool of more than £60,000 (€71,500) will be up for grabs at the Lakeland and Inland Waterways Ireland World Pairs Championship, coming to the border counties this September.

Described by the organisers as "a pairs match the type of which has never been seen before", the competition will run from 9-15 September at various locations in Monaghan, Leitrim, Cavan and Fermanagh.

The format of the match is based purely on total weight of the pair of anglers over the four competition days. On the off days there will be further open matches so anglers can make the most of the great fishing available in Ireland during September.

The exact sections and format of the match are yet to be disclosed, as much depends on the numbers of anglers attending - although the prize pool is guaranteed.

Entry per pair is £90 (£45 per angler) with discounts for booking through one of the official travel companies.

"You dont need to be 'venue experts' to win this match," say the organisers, "you just need to be able to catch roach and bream, and there are some massive shoals of them to be found in the lakes and rivers that the event will be staged on."

The organisers add: "Absolutely anyone can enter and you are all in with a chance of winning - while fishing in the beautiful surroundings of the Irish countryside."

For more information, entry forms and travel arrangements, visit the Talk Angling forum or contact Kevin Lockee at 07736 129 627.

Published in Angling
Monaghan's Elaine 'Shooter' Alexander will soon begin her challenge to be come the first Northern Irish woman to circumnavigate the island of Ireland by kayak, the OutdoorNI Adventure Blog reports.
On 3 May she will set off from the newly refurbished County Antrim Yacht Club at Belfast Lough on a 1,000-mile trek that's expected to take two months to complete.
Alexander will be paddling clockwise around Ireland, taking on tides, cliffs, headlands - and Ireland's unpredicable weather.
The Ulster woman has been training since last year for the challenge, which is intended to raise funds for the Fermanagh-based SHARE, a charity that brings together disabled and non-disabled people in arts and outdoor-based activities.
“Last year I paddled around Ulster which took 26 days and prepared me for some of what to expect for this expedition," says the competitive kayaker, who represented Northern Ireland twice at the Surf Kayak World Championships.
'Shooter' will also be posting regular updates of her trip on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Details on this as well as how to donate are available on her website www.canoearoundireland.com.
The OutdoorNI Adventure Blog has more on the story HERE.

Monaghan's Elaine 'Shooter' Alexander will soon begin her challenge to be come the first Northern Irish woman to circumnavigate the island of Ireland by kayak, the OutdoorNI Adventure Blog reports.

On 3 May she will set off from the newly refurbished County Antrim Yacht Club at Belfast Lough on a 1,000-mile trek that's expected to take two months to complete.

Alexander will be paddling clockwise around Ireland, taking on tides, cliffs, headlands - and Ireland's unpredicable weather.

The Ulster woman has been training since last year for the challenge, which is intended to raise funds for the Fermanagh-based SHARE, a charity that brings together disabled and non-disabled people in arts and outdoor-based activities.

“Last year I paddled around Ulster which took 26 days and prepared me for some of what to expect for this expedition," says the competitive kayaker, who represented Northern Ireland twice at the Surf Kayak World Championships.

'Shooter' will also be posting regular updates of her trip on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Details on this as well as how to donate are available on her website www.canoearoundireland.com.

The OutdoorNI Adventure Blog has more on the story HERE.

Published in Canoeing

Ireland's Trading Ketch Ilen

The Ilen is the last of Ireland’s traditional wooden sailing ships.

Designed by Limerick man Conor O’Brien and built in Baltimore in 1926, she was delivered by Munster men to the Falkland Islands where she served valiantly for seventy years, enduring and enjoying the Roaring Forties, the Furious Fifties, and Screaming Sixties.

Returned now to Ireland and given a new breath of life, Ilen may be described as the last of Ireland’s timber-built ocean-going sailing ships, yet at a mere 56ft, it is capable of visiting most of the small harbours of Ireland.

Wooden Sailing Ship Ilen FAQs

The Ilen is the last of Ireland’s traditional wooden sailing ships.

The Ilen was designed by Conor O’Brien, the first Irish man to circumnavigate the world.

Ilen is named for the West Cork River which flows to the sea at Baltimore, her home port.

The Ilen was built by Baltimore Sea Fisheries School, West Cork in 1926. Tom Moynihan was foreman.

Ilen's wood construction is of oak ribs and planks of larch.

As-built initially, she is 56 feet in length overall with a beam of 14 feet and a displacement of 45 tonnes.

Conor O’Brien set sail in August 1926 with two Cadogan cousins from Cape Clear in West Cork, arriving at Port Stanley in January 1927 and handed it over to the new owners.

The Ilen was delivered to the Falkland Islands Company, in exchange for £1,500.

Ilen served for over 70 years as a cargo ship and a ferry in the Falkland Islands, enduring and enjoying the Roaring Forties, the Furious Fifties, and Screaming Sixties. She stayed in service until the early 1990s.

Limerick sailor Gary McMahon and his team located Ilen. MacMahon started looking for her in 1996 and went out to the Falklands and struck a deal with the owner to bring her back to Ireland.

After a lifetime of hard work in the Falklands, Ilen required a ground-up rebuild.

A Russian cargo ship transported her back on a 12,000-mile trip from the Southern Oceans to Dublin. The Ilen was discharged at the Port of Dublin 1997, after an absence from Ireland of 70 years.

It was a collaboration between the Ilen Project in Limerick and Hegarty’s Boatyard in Old Court, near Skibbereen. Much of the heavy lifting, of frames, planking, deadwood & backbone, knees, floors, shelves and stringers, deck beams, and carlins, was done in Hegarty’s. The generally lighter work of preparing sole, bulkheads, deck‐houses fixed furniture, fixtures & fittings, deck fittings, machinery, systems, tanks, spar making and rigging is being done at the Ilen boat building school in Limerick.

Ten years. The boat was much the worse for wear when it returned to West Cork in May 1998, and it remained dormant for ten years before the start of a decade-long restoration.

Ilen now serves as a community floating classroom and cargo vessel – visiting 23 ports in 2019 and making a transatlantic crossing to Greenland as part of a relationship-building project to link youth in Limerick City with youth in Nuuk, west Greenland.

At a mere 56ft, Ilen is capable of visiting most of the small harbours of Ireland.

©Afloat 2020