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Displaying items by tag: SeaFest 2011

The shores of Lough Swilly in Co Donegal will come alive with sails at SeaFest 2011 from 1-3 July, celebrating the region's unique coastal environment.
The weekend begins on Friday 1 July with the launch of MalinWaters, a new cross-border marine tourism initiative for the zone between the north of Ireland and western Scotland.
It's followed on the Saturday with a parade of sails and action in the Saldanha Cup, a traditional cruiser-racer sailing regatta that commemorates the 200th anniversary of the sinking of the frigate HMS Saldanha, with a course that takes on the wreck site of the ship near Ballymastocker Strand.
Among the myriad family events taking place on shore, SeaFest will also feature an abundance of Donegal's local food culture, such as fresh seafood from local waters, plus lamb, beef and pork from the county's field, prepared by talented chefs from the region.
For more details visit seafestloughswilly.com.

The shores of Lough Swilly in Co Donegal will come alive with sails at SeaFest 2011 from 1-3 July, celebrating the region's unique coastal environment.

The weekend begins on Friday 1 July with the launch of MalinWaters, a new cross-border marine tourism initiative for the zone between the north of Ireland and western Scotland.

It's followed on the Saturday with a parade of sails and action in the Saldanha Cup, a traditional cruiser-racer sailing regatta that commemorates the 200th anniversary of the sinking of the frigate HMS Saldanha, with a course that takes on the wreck site of the ship near Ballymastocker Strand.

Among the myriad family events taking place on shore, SeaFest will also feature an abundance of Donegal's local food culture, such as fresh seafood from local waters, plus lamb, beef and pork from the county's field, prepared by talented chefs from the region.

For more details visit seafestloughswilly.com.

Published in Maritime Festivals

The Irish Cruiser Racing Association (ICRA) Information

The creation of the Irish Cruiser Racing Association (ICRA) began in a very low key way in the autumn of 2002 with an exploratory meeting between Denis Kiely, Jim Donegan and Fintan Cairns in the Granville Hotel in Waterford, and the first conference was held in February 2003 in Kilkenny.

While numbers of cruiser-racers were large, their specific locations were widespread, but there was simply no denying the numerical strength and majority power of the Cork-Dublin axis. To get what was then a very novel concept up and running, this strength of numbers had to be acknowledged, and the first National Championship in 2003 reflected this, as it was staged in Howth.

ICRA was run by a dedicated group of volunteers each of whom brought their special talents to the organisation. Jim Donegan, the elder statesman, was so much more interested in the wellbeing of the new organisation than in personal advancement that he insisted on Fintan Cairns being the first Commodore, while the distinguished Cork sailor was more than content to be Vice Commodore.

ICRA National Championships

Initially, the highlight of the ICRA season was the National Championship, which is essentially self-limiting, as it is restricted to boats which have or would be eligible for an IRC Rating. Boats not actually rated but eligible were catered for by ICRA’s ace number-cruncher Denis Kiely, who took Ireland’s long-established native rating system ECHO to new heights, thereby providing for extra entries which brought fleet numbers at most annual national championships to comfortably above the hundred mark, particularly at the height of the boom years. 

ICRA Boat of the Year (Winners 2004-2019)