start the boat on escape from rosecliff island

On the east- west voyage I was only caught out twice at night, with too much sail up. The weather and its symptoms always intrigued me and I well remember judging dawns while cycling to work, making my own diagnosis. All of these sports being near the water, which I loved. So here I was in my teens, sailing in summer, shooting in the, winter and fishing in between. To me this was heaven and in the winter months I learnt to wildfowl there. At that time his father and mother and family lived on the island farming, fishing and fowling.

There are two islands at the mouth of the Bunratty River, one of which is Greene's Island. Here the river widens and gives no shelter. Every weekend, in my own 16’ sloop, which I bought when I was 16, I sailed down- stream with various friends, sleeping under a canvas over the boom, one on each side of the centre board caging or if the tide was suitable to get ashore, in a tent.Īt that time I was an apprentice cabinet- maker and I well remember on Saturday mornings looking through the sky- light at work, to see the clouds wondering if we would have to either, beat, reach, or run, down- stream: The Shannon runs south west from Limerick and the prevailing winds run up it, so if the wind was above Force 4, we never got below Bunratty Creek - about nine miles down. The first fifteen miles downstream is very serpentine, having mud- flats, rocks, creeks, islands and marshes. The River Shannon, from the bridge at Limerick, is sixty miles from the Atlantic. In it he described stitching his way with bad sails, and pumping a leaking hull, from Gibraltar via the southern route to New York in the year 1923. There was a library in the club and the first book I read on ocean voyaging was 'The Fight of the Firecrest', written by Alain Gerbault, a Frenchman. Eventually I passed my sailing test by the sailing captain and was given my ticket to sail in the “Falcon”. From that day on whenever |I got the chance I was his crew and I will never forget my first sail, being pushed along by the wind. One day at the slipway she was being rigged by a senior member nicknamed Admiral Bottles, who asked me would I like to crew. Among the pleasure boats in the club was a 17' half decked sloop, called the 'Falcon'. In my particular case it was a dream I have always had since I bought my first boat at sixteen.Īt fifteen, when I joined the Limerick Boat Club to row, the Captain said I was too light to row, so they put me coxing. What makes a person decide to sail the Atlantic single handed in a boat under 26'.

Start the boat on escape from rosecliff island