All the news thats new!!

And so we passed a few more days in Pwllheli sitting out some windy weather.
Still it wasn’t a bad place with plenty of good bus connections… we went to Portmadog and had a couple of Purple Moose (“Dark side of the Moose” has to take the cake as one of the best beer names ever!) and several other local ales after taking a very long stroll along the headland and ended up in the back of Portmerrion – got us a free tour of their world garden where broke off a piece of beech tree to remind us of home. (We did think it was a bit odd that the path we had rambled along petered out then turned into a formal path with lovely signage and strange little sculptures from around the globe… quite surreal!! We got some strange looks with Bramble gambling along in front; apparently they don’t let dogs in!
Then we decided to jump a bus to Bangor and lash out on a couple of Kindles. Wow what a revelation – I can now download books from just about anywhere, anytime, in the blink of an eye… fancy War and Peace… yes please… zap from the ether via Whispernet (sounds a bit sinister I know but 3G is awesome!) and there she appears, the great tome on my diddy little black book. Didn’t think it would “melt into my hand” but turns out within days I am trying to turn the pages on it by hand so there you go, marketing that is right on the button!

News flash from the UK – Gumboots are in. Today was a waveboarding festival and it seems that the humble welly has made a comeback when worn with the shortest tightest shorts you can find… sounds to odd to be true, well it isn’t. The best young ladies sport “Hunters” (of course) but not just in jolly giant green but also yellow and blue and flowers and butterflies… there is even the ultimate accessory – the Wellington Sock that folds over the top of your boot to add a little extra flair… boy I am going to have to get me a pair for winter!

Finally the weather has settled down do we are off to Ireland today. So off we go motorsailing away until the weather picks up. Suddenly we are smoking along a 7 plus knots and spot some “windmills” in the distance – nope not marked on our charts but what the hey we head flat out towards them intending on shooting the gap of the Arklow Bar. Thankfully good sense prevailed when we suddenly went down to 4 metres from 20 plus and we reduce sail dramatically before creeping our way through the tiny gap in the sandbar. An exciting way to enter Ireland that’s for sure!
Arklow turns out to be an odd little introduction the modern Ireland. A scruffy pontoon in a river charging 33 euro a night next to a flash marina paid for with EU money and not quite finished – hummm what else does Ireland have in common with Greece I wonder??!

The graffiti on the Arklow entrance sums up their thoughts on the EU experiment…
“IMF – SOLD OUT – NANA STATE”

And so we begin our tour of the south and west coast of Ireland… (certainly couldn’t afford to stay in harbour!!)
So far it has been lovely – some good bays, some a bit rolly and others just lovely.

And what have we learned about Ireland…

“Being Irish, he had an abidng sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy” William Butler Yeats

 Its pretty and very green
 The Irish are as friendly as ever
 Its ridiculously expensive – not dubbed “The Rip Off Republic” for nothing!
 There is no where to put your rubbish and if there is it cost $10/bag!
 They don’t like dogs much and they can’t go everywhere
 You can’t buy alcohol before 10.30am and its 12.30 on Sundays! Apparently binge drinking is a problem here too… before 10.30am? Now that’s serious!
 Marinas are hideously expensive and quite often you have to pay for showers etc on top! Hence there are less boats out now the recession is on and we are one of the larger boats here.
 The Irish are obsessive exercisers and think nothing of swimming around an island and across harbours in the freezing cold for fun – why “because its there so it is”
 They don’t go in for walking tracks though so you take your life in your hands walking on the country roads
 Needless to say there aren’t a lot of fat people in Ireland
 Murray thinks they may be dying their hair as there aren’t as many dark haired lasses as there should be
 The church has lost its hold – the kiddy fiddling fiasco has taken its toll here
 The pubs aren’t as “Trad” as they should be – all façade and neon lit wine bars at the back
 The Irish love to fish and each bay tells you what you can catch and what to catch it with – watch out little fishes your days are numbered!
 The Irish accent is getting stronger… must get one of the Babel Fish translators going…
 The amount of new houses and huge houses that have been built is outrageous! In 2006 90,000 new homes were built compared with 85,000 in the UK (Irelands population is only about 6 million; the UK has 14 times the that population!) At one time over 40% of the population was involved in the building industry and funds generated equalled about 15% of the GNP. When the bubble burst the unemployment rate doubled in a year and now is around 17%.
 Costa has been busy at work here as well making roads, pouring concrete and tiling the bogs.
 The recession is one of the most talked about things here – the Celtic Tiger has been slain.

Note to New Zealand – join the EU; fill out the appropriate forms and you to can get harbour improvements, plenty of signage and very swanky bathrooms just don’t forget the money has to come from somewhere…
Today we heard they were planning on letting Greece away with further help and a longer time to pay it off and lower interest rates… talk about positive reinforcement for negative behaviour!

Incidents so far:
Murray had to call out the coastguard when the boat next to us tripped its own anchor and decided to take a wee trip down river at high speed. The lifeboat boys enjoyed their trip out and are sure to get some more funding as a result!

Slips are not called that for nothing… Murray “had a fall” whilst negotiating the Kinsale slip and can now officially be called a pain in the ass (the good news was he kept the clean washing dry!)

Bramble had an Irish boyfriend in Cork – but what happens on tour stays on tour!

When you are thinking of employing barstaff, get an Irishman as Spaniards can be arrogant b$#%^$#@! (It was day’s ago Cate, let it go!)

All that is green is not solid ground and seaweed does not constitute solid ground either… good job Bramble is a good sport and swimmer!

Anyway needless to say we are enjoying ourselves immensely; walking, kayaking and tripping about to our hearts content and generally sailing our arses off.
The boat is really great and after her naming ceremony – now officially “Coolchange” – has behaved impeccably and proved to be much faster than expected.
Top places in Ireland so far Kinsale and Castlehaven. Why?? Well you will just have to come and see for yourselves!

p.s. The sun does shine here occasionally – pass the sunscreen will you Murray…