it could hapen to you too

Saturday morning, rough water , wild surf and great waves at the rock  found a few of us surfing together

Israel in his short surf kayak meets Dror in his seakayak, they both flip over and Dror lands on top of Israel preventing him from rolling. Dror rolls while Israel exits his kayak

Dror offers to tow Israel back to shore as its quite difficult to empty and reenter the short surf kayak

Heres how they did it

meanwhile the SUPs were having a great time in the surf.

great gift

My brother Stuart and his 14year old son Jeremy having their first seakayaking lesson with me while on a visit to Israel. Hopefully when they go back home to Maryland some of the enjoyment will linger and maybe they will continue kayaking.

Stu brought me a gift of this cd that he found at a kayak shop near his home. For someone not in the know about things kayak wise it was a great choice. Here you have a history of river kayaking beginning with open canoes and ending with squirtboats. No sea kayaks though, but fascinating to see how the sport has grown into the huge attraction that it is today.

Highly recommended viewing for all kayakers
I guess you can get it from http://www.performancevideo.com/

Thanks  Stu and come visit again soon.

who killed the turtle?

This poor turtle was caught in a discarded fishing net and died. I cut the net and  pulled it onto the deck of my boat ,freed the turtle and headed for the shore.

The net was pretty heavy and stinky, rotting old jellyfish and bits of fish caught in it. I persuaded Danny and Izzy to tow me home

It was quite difficult to paddle with all this on my lap so the tow was very helpful.

here we go , back to the beach

Izzy had just launched his new kayak a few days ago

He built it in record time and it looks great

Here he is on his maiden voyage

Congrats, Izzy, may you have lots of happy moments in your new kayak, and thanks for the tow.

all good things have an end, but a sausage has two

We left on the ferry to Clare Island on a wet windy day, paddling was out of the question .

After settling in to the B&B we all met up at the local community center for  a beer and sandwich

Then went for a walk to the lighthouse and the Abby

Ali pointed out these newly refinished Curraghs, traditional Irish boats, skinned and tarred

Curragh racing is still a very popular sport in this region

Late evening light on the harbour

Optimists sheltering in the local pub

Tides out

Here we are at Roonah Head , beginning the last leg of our trip.

Ali found a cormorant tangled in a fishing line with a hook in his neck

Using his sprayskirt to hold the bird he performed emergency surgery and managed to free the poor thing.

The cliffs here were impressive too

Ali`s parents live close by and joined us for a short while. His mom showed us how to catch lunch.

After a while we entered a small harbour to the cheers of the locals

and then began a long crossing to the next island

Again the lighthouse was our reference point

 this area is full of small islands, mostly uninhabited, but used for summer

vacations

We had a short portage to save a few km.

And finally made it to our last B&B
Early next morning we began the long trip home after a fantastic week in Ireland.

Pure Magic

The weather was expected to change with a storm on the way and strong sw winds

We left our hilly campsite and improvised to keep our feet dry, at least Danny did. Ali paddled with gumboots.

We hugged the cliffs on the northern side of the island to get some protection from the wind

The scenery was pure magic

Black rocks, green grass and caves and crevices  all along the way

Avital was getting the hang of her boat by now and enjoying it more and more

We stayed in a tight group

explored the sea caves

paddled through rock arches

all the while staying as close to the shore as we could. the wind was pretty strong

Waterfalls were handy for filling our dwindling  water supplies

there were some proctected coves

After a long haul against the howling wind we hid behind the wall before making a landing on a small beach

Ali pitched the tipi on the grass, we made an amazing pot of hot bean and vegetable soup and then  arranged for transport to the next B&B. Some of us stayed to load the kayaks when Charlene arrived

Luckily we finished our days paddle just as the storm broke and the rain came pouring down

This is the B&B we stayed in for the next 2 nights, can`t think of a better name. Its actually run by a Frenchman as a kite surfing center.The food was good and he had a nice bar and pool table, so we spent  some down time out of the weather.