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Wexford Quays

Published October 19, 2008 in Wexford, History, Ireland and Maritime. 1 Comment

Trawlers moored on the quays at Wexford. The only remaining commercial activity on the quays of Wexford harbour are these Mussel boats, who harvest from the Mussel beds in the harbour, and unload their blue mussel cargo on the ferry bank breakwater side of the river Slaney, opposite to the side these photos are taken. Earlier in the 1800’s there was a vibrant shipping industry with wharves and shipbuilding, there are old photos of the quay full of sailing ships. In the earlier part of the 20th century there were shallow draft coasters arriving on the quays from the UK and continent, delivering directly to the warehouses on the quays, but due to the silting and hazardous navigation in the harbour further development of the port was not possible, and Rosslare took over as the main port of Wexford now all of the warehouses are gone, some of the granary buildings have been preserved but most of it is commercial property and apartments. Some of the pubs on the quay have a few relics from the old days. The nearby Rosslare Harbour is a deep water port and has regular traffic with the UK and the continent, then there is Waterford further along the coast to the South east and of course Dublin to the North. The construction of the dykes in the late 1800’s on the North and South sides of the harbour to reclaim land in polder fashion to form the sloblands was the reason that the harbour silted up, and also the construction of Rosslare harbour contributed to this silting up, this and the change of currents led to some coastal erosion and deposition in the harbour and the sea slowly swallowed up the Forth Village where some of my ancestors came from, many of them seafarers, there is no trace of the village now.
The Vikings were probably the first to discover the mud and silt in the harbour around 300AD, no doubt a few of them ran aground on the sandbanks and the named the place Veisafjorðr which means harbour of the mudflats and the name became Wexford eventually. A few notable Wexford mariners are John Barry “father of the US Navy” ( debatable if you meet any John Paul Jones fans) and Robert McClure of Northwest Passage fame. No wonder I chose a career at sea, with all the salty blood in my veins.

Size matters

Published October 19, 2008 in cars, Ireland, from Erin, stating the obvious and At home. 2 Comments

While the size of Ireland’s economy has grown since I left, the size of the parking spaces is still the same. The only space left was between these two behemoths, I was sorely tempted to drive in at speed and scrape steel, but I had a hire car and the owners of the beemers were probably lawyers. Or their wives, it was after all the Brown Thomas multi story. For some reason a lot of people feel the need to extend their egos with large motor vehicles, the likes of which were never meant for the Irish inner city road network. When I was a young lad, farmers had Land Rovers for pulling beasts in boxes around the highways and byways to marts and horse races, note the term Land Rover, for roving the land, not the city. These days it’s the yummy mummy’s and yuppies and anybody else who feels the need to drive a big fuck off jeep, in the city mind, you wouldn’t want to be getting any shit or dirt on the alloy wheels. There should be a test (no gobshites) before being allowed to buy one and you should have to own a horse or something, but the car salesmen don’t give a shite either. No one cares and everybody complains? How does that work?

Apparently there was once two way traffic on the Main Street in Wexford, but the propulsion method was horses, and the only fumes were from manure. This is a classic example of Irish parking, halfway up on the path as if that will make it better, no consideration or thought put into this manouvre. The pram drivers are forced out on the road, into the raging torrent of traffic. Pedestrians and cyclists might squeeze by, but could scrape the paintwork, oh dear. I didn’t notice any scrapes but I walked on the outside, the cyclist who swerved to avoid me while I was taking the picture might have done some damage as he mounted the path and made for the space between a car and a hard place…..bloody photographers, a menace to society!

Asgard II sinks in the Bay of Biscay.

Published September 13, 2008 in Sinking, sailing ships, training, wrecks, Ireland, Navigation, Maritime and Irish. 8 Comments

Asgard
the entry in my Discharge book from AsgardII

I read on the internet that the Irish Sail Training Vessel Asgard II sunk on the 11th of September 2008, in the Bay of Biscay. I was deeply saddened to learn of this event, not only because I had done a stint as a trainee on her 17 years ago this November coming, but I have also many dear friends who are closely associated with Asgard II. There are plenty of people who are experts about sailing and tall ships, I am not. I just had one of those lifetime experiences back in 1991 sailing a real tall ship.

I joined her with a gang of trainees in Dublin, and we were to do a trip across to the Isle of Man then on to Wales and back to Dublin. There was plenty of wind so getting under sail wasn’t an issue. One of the first things we had to do after being allocated our bunks and muster stations was to go “up and over” meaning climbing up the rigging to the top of the mast and down the other side. It wasn’t so hard, the ship was alongside and still, I climbed up the first set of ratlines, then you had to reach backwards and climb up the second set, and finally the same for the third set to get to the top of the mast, then climb over and down the other side. I think everyone made it. A few grey faces but no casualties or cases of vertigo. Then we learned the orders for “sheets and tacks”. After a few hours of getting lessons and being divided into port and starboard watches, we sailed from Dublin.

The weather was shite, and before long half the trainees were vomiting over the side, one guy was being washed over with sea and just puking all the time as we rolled and pitched in the Irish sea with the stink of sweat, diesel and boiled cabbage coming from below. The skipper didn’t seem too worried and we had nearly all the sails out. We got to Port St. Mary in the Isle of Man and moored, the weather got worse and we had to put out extra moorings, we still managed to pull a couple of fairleads from their mountings. After a rough night alingside we had a fairly pleasant morning, and we sailed to Douglas, on the way the Bosun wanted 2 volunteers to “go aloft” and strike a sail, I was quick off the mark and he pulled me aside and dug his hard fingers into my shoulder and said “If you think you can’t make it, climb down, no one will think less of you” So I started climbing, about half way up I felt my legs turning to lead and my head started spinning and I thought “fuck this” and was about to climb down when I saw one of the girls climbing up fast as you like blonde curly hair blowing in the wind and right behind me, I would have had to climb over her to get down, valour got the better of discretion and I bit my tongue hard between my back teeth until I could taste blood, and up I went like a monkey, there was no way I was going to look a gobshite in front of the assembled ranks on the decks below even though the ship was rolling and I could see blue water below me half the time. Later back on deck when the adrenaline had faded the bosun gave me a nod, and said “you were thinking about backing?” I nodded he smiled and said “that’s why I sent up blondie!”

On the way back from Wales we had some of the worst weather that had been experienced on the Irish Sea in decades, we were rolling and pitching and the seas were huge piling up behind as we cork screwed across the sea. I wasn’t so scared because I was soaked and puking in between getting salty waves across my face, so I just wanted to die. Finally we got to Dublin. In the end I didn’t want to get off.

17 years ago. The memory is still as fresh as if it was yesterday, the experience of a lifetime. Unforgettable.

Asgard II what a loss.

Wexford Spring 2008

Published April 6, 2008 in Wexford, Tourist and Ireland. 2 Comments

Wexford Spring 2008

Development. Building. Population expansion. New demography. Dog shit. One way. Traffic jam. Car society. Out of town retail. Main Street changes. Polish language and groceries. Youth. Sports clothes shops. Giant Tesco store. Cracked uneven pavement. Road works. Sunshine. Quay extension. SUV. Diesel fumes. Luminous yellow singlets. Buskers. Beggars. Smiles. Frowns. Familiar faces. Funerals. Gardaí. Protective vests. No smoking. Pints. Pub. Double parking. Double Standards. Over too fast…….next time will be longer…….

Berties exit

Published April 2, 2008 in Bertie, Ireland, Irish, Denmark and Politics. 1 Comment

The Teflon Taoiseach has finally decided to throw in the towel, even teflon wears out in the end and the non-stick surface was getting thinner and thinner and as the heat was starting to burn……resignation, in the interests of the people the nation and nothing whatsoever to do with the tribunals oh no. I heard the news in Danish, we had the local FM radio going as the ship was heading through the Great Belt in Denmark when I heard”Bertie Ahearn, Sinn Fein and Gerry Adams” in the space of 30 seconds so I knew it had to be big if the Danes were bothering their holes to report it. And sure enough a quick surf on the net confirmed the truth.

Bye bye Bertie.

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