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Fall Cruise from Mayo to Donegal. Part 2: Inishkeas to Teelin

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Crossing Donegal Bay in shades of grey again. (Click on photos to enlarge.) We left the anchorage in the Inishkeas rather late, thinking we would stop in Broadhaven or Killala for the night. But then we came up with the brilliant idea of pushing to get to Teelin and having a another day off to visit Slieve League while we were there. The seas had calmed but there wasn't enough wind to propel Aleria , so we motor sailed up the Mayo coast. 

Fall cruise from Mayo to Donegal. Part 1: Clew Bay to the Inishkeas

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Departing Clew Bay on the morning tide. (Click on photos to enlarge.) Confused seas off Achill Head. On a beautiful Thursday morning in mid-October, we departed from Clew Bay on the outgoing tide. High tide was at 8 am and we needed to get out early to make the 50-mile trip to the Inishkeas. The sky turned an amazing purple, with the morning sunrise breaking through heavily overcast skies. The weather in Ireland had been miserable all summer, but October proved spectacular. Very little rain, not too windy, and not too cold. This morning, the forecast was for clearing skies and light winds in the morning, with wind dying out in the afternoon.

I lost my sole in the Inishkeas

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Flopping along made it hard to sneak up on wildlife.   You might have read the title and thought, “How could she allow such a major typographical error, and in the title no less?” Indeed, it is probable that I lost my soul among those enchanted deserted islands as well. But, no, this time it was indeed my sole and before it was all over, both soles were given over to the islands, though only figuratively as I did not leave them behind.

Aleria spends winter with the big boys in Killybegs

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Overwintering in Galway. Aleria, at 57 feet long, is often one of the larger yachts in a marina. For the last few years, she spent the winters in the water in Galway Harbour. Not a bad place to be as the marina is smack in the middle of the old city. It’s great to have an apartment right in the heart of town. Unfortunately Galway does not yet have the facilities to haul vessels of Aleria ’s size, but when the new marina comes in, hopefully it will. 

Apps for sailing

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Navigating the old fashioned way.     Navionics app on Samsung mobile. What on earth did we do with ourselves in the days before apps came into our lives?  Can I even remember?  Let's see. We read books. We navigated by dead reckoning. We waited until landfall to call people. Now it's all immediate. I once joked with a reported who was interviewing me that I learned to scuba dive so I could go on holiday where clients couldn't reach me -- underwater.  Yet, it's a bit too true that today we are forever accessible. This cannot be good. However, even I find myself caught up in the app collection craze. When one considers that more than half of responders to a survey of blue water sailors say they have 4 or more devices with GPS on board, you can reckon that dead reckoning is indeed dead. I don’t have an iPad.   I have a Samsung android smartphone. They all have GPS now.  Even our camera has GPS. Take a picture and you'll know your exact location. My new

The social side of sailing

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There is a camaraderie in sailing that I have not found in many other pursuits. For example, it is rare to strike up a conversation with other skiers who are unknown to you on the mountain, even during lunch at large communal tables. Yet put two sailors in a room together and before you know they have become the best of friends.

Voices of the Past in Ireland's Abandoned Islands

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Achillbeg house. There are places where humans once roamed and lived and worked that have been abandoned and are on their way back to natural states. As these places transition between times, walking where people long forgotten once walked can be a rather eerie experience. Voices carry on the wind, children's laughter echoes off the crumbling walls, and shadows pass over the hills playing with your mind's eye. And so it is on many of the deserted islands off the west coast of Ireland.

Achillbeg - the small island next to Ireland's largest island, Achill

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Rainbow between Clare and Achillbeg It was a strange summer that never happened, with chill winds and rain nonstop. So when the forecast was for moderate winds in the range of 15 knots out of the North, we decided to head off to the Inishkeas. It would be cool but we can handle that. But, as often happens, the forecast was not true to its word and the squalls that blew through with occasional heavy rain, arctic cold, and blasts of wind in the range of 25 knots caused us to divert to Achillbeg to see if the conditions might abate. They did not, which meant we had a lovely day at anchor off Achillbeg.

An annual pilgrimage to Clare Island

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Clare Island at the mouth of Clew Bay Every year, we visit Clare Island primarily because it's an easy sail from our anchorage but also because there is so much to see there.  The Saw Doctors have immortalized the experienced in their song about the place: Will you meet me on Clare Island Summer stars are in the sky We'll get the ferry out from Roonagh And wave all our cares goodbye And we'll go dancing at the ceili We'll go kissing on the strand Take our clothes off in the moonlight Skinny-dipping hand in hand And we'll start drinking in the twilight Keep it up until the dawn In both the bars Because there's no guards To take our names and send us home.

Lessons in leadership from the sea

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The author as President of the HBA addressing an audience of more than 2000 healthcare executives. Being in charge of your universe by Daria Blackwell Many people in leadership positions, myself included, assumed their roles by chance. Not thinking of themselves as leaders, they got things done that needed doing. Someone had to step up to keep the ship from foundering. They may not have had all the skills they needed to fulfill their roles effectively at the time, but they had the right attitude. They knew it could be done.

Voyaging with Kids. A guide to family life afloat.

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So you made the decision to go cruising with your family to expose them to a richer life at the edge of nature and replete with cultural experience. You just buy a boat, pack up your kids, and shove off, right?  Oh no. How will you provide for their education, feed them in exotic places where the foods are all different, wash diapers and ensure their safety.  Until now, there has been no resource available for families afloat. Thanks to these authors, everything is now about to change.  

Lightning strikes...twice!

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Dangerous cloud-to-ground lightning by Daria Blackwell A boat we once owned had the unlikely misfortune of having been struck by lightning twice. She had a dissipator on her mast, her rig was not unusually tall, and she was always moored in a crowded mooring field.  Yet, somehow, the lightning liked her best. A study published last year in Science ( Science 14 November 2014: Vol. 346 no. 6211 pp. 851-854 DOI: 10.1126/science.125910 ) concluded that lightning strikes are predicted to increase 12 ± 5% per degree Celsius of global warming and about 50% over this century.  With the increase in likelihood of a strike, what do we need to know to protect ourselves and our vessels? Here are a

The versatile ketch rig

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Aleria off Jura in Scotland --main, yankee and mizzen flying -- in the company of a sloop. . by Daria Blackwell When my husband Alex and I decided we wanted to cross oceans, we had certain criteria we wanted to take into account. Chiefly, we wanted a boat that sailed well, was comfortable and safe when crossing oceans and comfortable at anchor as well. After all, we were going to spend more of our time not moving than moving. But when we did move, we might be needing a stable platform in a storm.  That excluded many of the modern production boats, which tend to be beamy and flat. We also decided that we would be looking at ketch rigs. 

Finding a solution for 'Solution'

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Solution seen on the YB tracker in Horta. Pico seen from Horta, spinning off lenticular clouds. Our friend, Carter Bacon, had been planning this trip across the Atlantic for years. His classic yacht, Solution , is a wooden 50 footer built by Nielsen in Maine in 1963. He entered the Transatlantic Race of 2015 as a means by which to get her across the pond to sail the other side for a while. His wife, Peggy, would join him in Ireland where her parents had a home; they intended to cruise for a few weeks before bringing her up to Scotland for the winter and next year's cruising.

Learning to maneuver in tight spaces

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We're just getting ready to  spend a little time in marinas, which is always a source of consternation for us. We have a 40-year-old, 57-foot classic ketch with no bow thruster. She's got a modified fin keel and heavy displacement. In other words, Aleria doesn't maneuver very well in tight spaces. She is meant to be crossing oceans. That's one of the reasons we really like to anchor out.  But in reality eventually we're going to have to get to a dock for fuel, water, or overnight in the absence of a safe anchorage. So we have had to learn how to use what we have to get ourselves into tight spaces. Here are several techniques that we've found very useful.

The weather in the West of Ireland was filthy, but we couldn’t not sail!

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Is there anything out there but miserable weather? Summer Sailstice, a global celebration of sailing on the longest day of the year   A sliver of blue sky was hopeful We sailed out of our inlet in Clew Bay at half tide. That’s when we can make it over the shellfish bed that runs across the entrance.   We had about a foot of water beneath our keel at the shallowest.   But that was not so much the issue. The issue was that the morning was cold, dark, damp and just miserable. Oh, and it was flat calm.  When we got out into Clew Bay, there was not a boat in sight.   Then, a really dark cloud came by and it started to rain. Alex and I looked at each other and knew what we were thinking. Should we turn back and get back in while the tide is still with us?   Nah, we kept going in the shadow of the Holy Mountain, Croagh Patrick.

Top 10+ Cookbooks for Boaters

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Recipes to keep your crew from jumping ship Birthday cake I baked for myself while on an Atlantic crossing. Alex catches a small tuna mid-Atlantic.   Anyone who has done any extensive cruising will have had to deal with provisioning and stowing food, cooking while underway in rough conditions, keeping a diversity of crew happy, dealing with unfamiliar ingredients, having either too much (fish) or too little (fresh veg) food available, substituting ingredients, the art of the pot luck dinner, and disposing of packaging. There are plenty of other elements to deal with, like cramped quarters and availability of gas, so voyaging by boat can be a tricky thing, and getting ideas from other people doing the same thing is always helpful.   I decided to compile a list of cookbooks for boaters and was surprised to find there were so many new ones on the market. Most are available in both print and electronic formats, so you can have your preferred edition and access an elect

The meaning of home

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Where the mountains come down to the sea along the Wild Atlantic Way Home is a question I've been contemplating my entire life. So on this day, my birthday, I will begin to try to answer that question. I published a post recently about having found home along the wild Atlantic way in Ireland. Today, I want to explore the meaning of home and ask a new question: how did I know it when I found it? Is home the landscape that burns itself into your psyche? When you ask people what 'home' means to them, you'll get a variety of different answers. Some of them are dependant on culture, others on circumstance. Home to many is the place you live. For some it's where you came from. For others it's where they are heading to. For some it is the house they grew up in. For others it is the house they built. For me a house never equates with the concept of home. A house can be an empty place. Home is warm and inviting. The place you feel safe and content. The

Taking care of business

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To write or not to write is never the question Almost a month ago now, we released Cruising the Wild Atlantic Way . It's been an interesting few weeks and we are now awaiting a shipment of books to take to book stores around the country to see if we might sell a few in the local shops in towns mentioned in the book.  We know we won't be getting wealthy from this effort, but it is quite rewarding to get a positive review and know that today, you made someone smile.

Finding Paradise along the Wild Atlantic Way

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Having sailed the entire west coast of Ireland and calling Clew Bay home, we've been blogging about this most impressive sailing territory for years. We have an amazing collection of photos that captures the remarkable and stunning beauty. Some time ago, I started to organize my blog posts and photos and work on a book long before it actually began to take on a life of its own. So when Failte Ireland decided to focus on the Wild Atlantic Way, it was a natural to collect what we already had into a resource that could tie in to that effort. Cruising the Wild Atlantic Way was born to help those following in our wake.