Seaweed weekend

Saturday (telegram mode)

- Wake up before 6am, hardly able to open eyes.
- Surf looks terrible --it's extremely windy (wrong direction)
- Back to sleep, check surf again at 7:30-8. Similar-looking.
- Move car and sleep in, making time for cafe to open.
- Book seaweed bath.
- Have lovely, slow breakfast while editing last weekend pictures on my laptop.
- Seaweed bath: super relaxing, cleansing experience at Voya, Strandhill.
- Drive to Streedagh: too small.
- Eat pil-pil prawn salad + glass of wine in Grange.
- Drive to Mayo looking for sheltered surf spot.
- Find one, surf small, fun waves with a semi-local, very friendly guy.

Sunday

The wind at 6am was not quite as strong as over night, but the direction was still wrong and the waves at Easky right didn't look appealing. After deciding not to surf at Easky or Enniscrone, I ate breakfast at Magumbha's, a lovely cafe with awesome food and friendly staff, while waiting for the tide to go out and come back in to surf a particular spot. I met a semi-retired man who told me about his daughters' friends being surfers too. They all live in Dublin and are happy to come see him on the West coast, where he lives. The man used to live in London and worked at several pubs, then owned one. He only moved back to Ireland when his parents had delicate health. He was a very friendly and chatty person, an interesting one. He told me a story he wants to write about --we wanted to be a writer when he was growing up, and he encouraged me to write about my experiences (so here I am, writing on my blog months after my last post!)

Sunday was a beautiful rainy day. I headed for Mayo, where I'd surfed on Saturday. Kilala, a very neat little village I'd driven through 1.5 months ago, was full of cars parked near the church. Then, following the coastline, I passed next to a sandy-bottom area at low tide: I was in awe. I felt fortunate I was forced to drive slowly behind a car with a horse trailer, which allowed me to gaze at the sandy beauty regularly.

The tidal area passed Kilala is very extense and beautiful. I've always appreciated low tide sceneries -they don't stop to amaze me. The road became narrower here and I was all surrounded by green, by bushes and trees over-hanging on the cars. Hardly any traffic. Just light rain, green vegetation and a one-way lane old stone bridge crossing over a river.

I got to my destination a bit early: I walked around and checked the cliff drop near the parking area, then headed in the direction of the wave to take a closer look. The wave isn't quite working yet but I knot it'll improve with the incoming tide.

"I'm standing by a slab, observing the beauty of nature. Rocks here are almost like cubes, reminding me of a cubism painting. They seem man-cut and then eroded by nature. The seaweed on the flat rock looks like moss. It covers the flat rock and where there is a lump, the seaweed goes up accordingly. The rock platform ends at a 90º edge and falls straight down; here, the bright green seaweed drops too, serving as a funnel for water constantly dripping to fall onto the bottom, horizontal rock."

"While I observe the little wave at the slab, I pay attention and I listen to the drops falling on my waterproof jacket. My body is fully covered by clothes wrapping around me. My prescription glasses are perfectly covered by the cap I'm wearing, in turn covered by my jacket's hood, attached at the front over my chin. It's windy: the wind pushes me gently and makes me move. I listen to the strong wind. The breaking of the waves makes some sound too, but the place feels calm --I'm at the edge of civilization."

Slightly cold, I started to head back to the car and kill 20-30 minutes, to then check the wave again. A few steps later I noticed my brand new friend, the semi-local surfer, heading in my direction to check the surf. We greeted each other and went back closer to the wave. We chatted while waiting for the tide to be noticeable and soon headed back to the cars to get changed. We had a wonderful surf session on our own, with lefts peeling unsensitive to the strong wind blowing outside this sheltered spot. We were in the water for at least 2 hours, catching waves constantly, taking unspoken turns. Waves were waist to chest high for the most part, with some shoulder-high at the standout sets. I had not had such a nice session in a long time.

Hiking in Yeats country

Yesterday I mistreated my friend Axel by making him leave the Dublin area around 5:30am, driving to the West coast, waiting around while I surfed, and then hiking. I surfed at Easky and Enniscrone (images by other people) inspite of the poor surf conditions (blown out). Getting wet is always nice, but I cut both session short it wasn't all that worth it. We then drove north of Sligo town for some hiking in Yeats Country.

We had great fun under typical Irish weather (sun, rain, sun, clouds, sun, and wind throughout), hiking on a paved road inside a beautiful forest with tall trees and pervasive green grass underneath, then on dirt road and finally (and mostly!), outbounds, jumping and skipping on muddy bushes and mossy areas between creeks. We took a nice break by a little river, at a spot sheltered from the wind, full of different types of moss and other plants. The sun shone for most of the day and that was lovely! After the hike we went to Streedagh and Mullaghmore for some sight-seeing and scooter riding along the coast.

Streedagh strand

:)

Androifidying ourselves

Fish head

Driving into Yeats Country

Water sculpture

:)

Water Sculpture from Shinichi Maruyama on Vimeo.

Dalkey last weekend

Alright, it's a little late... but I wanted to share this cool initiative going on in Dalkey:

The local shops are showing cards made by kids :)

And this is my town covered in snow :)

Weather in my favorite places

Surfing on the West Coast - slideshow

Alba a Co. Sligo

Overnight in Strandhill.

Beautiful sunrise by the ocean and early morning drive to Easky with the typical warm-colored light from the rising sun.

Check out the album I just created in Picasa Web Albums:

Sunrise hill, this morning.

Sunset waves, last night.

Free like a bird!

On this bank holiday weekend I did my first trip with Tarrumòbil, the well-aged Toyota Corolla I just bought from a colleague who is moving out of the country.

It's so nice to be free to travel around wherever I want, whether it is to have a surf solo session at a reef break or to join my friends for lunch at the beach bar after their surf session.

On Friday I left the office and headed backt o Dalkey to pack my car. Surfboard, wetsuit, sleeping bags, blankets and food. I took of a little after 7pm and drove to Sligo. Only a few minutes earlier I was planning on going to Kerry instead, because the surf forecast looked slightly better over there. However, some friends were gonna be in Sligo and I figured that, since it was the first trip on my car, I'd go to the area I'm most familiar with and enjoy my friends company in the water or outside.

First session: Easky left all over the place

Friday I car-camped in Easky and I surfed Easky left in the morning. The first few surfers went out while I was going to buy some coffee and was debating whether to drive to Enniscrone instead. By the time I came back, drank my coffee and got changed, everyone'd come back in, so I had a solo session. The waves were between should and overhead high. Some looked really nice, but they were breaking all over the place and there was a strong current to the right, which made it hard to make it all the way to the left of the lineup and wait there for the best waves. Chris got changed while I paddled out and he was very nice stick around in case something happened to me (I was surfing on my own).

When I came in Chris informed he was joining our friends from the East Coast surf club at Aughris for a mellower surf. I also headed there afterwards, but I didn't go out because the waves didn't look too good. We all had lunch at the Beach bar and then split into two groups to go surf in different areas.

Second session: Memorable sunset surf

Chris and I had a memorable session in Enniscrone, both thanks to the waves and the magnificent sunset of which we became spectators. Thank god we didn't leave without getting wet, as we were about to! Enniscrone is always hard to judge for us: looking at it from the hill that leads to the harbor, the downhill perspective is a real teaser. Looking at it from the beach, the waves are so far that it's very hard to tell how big they are, unless someone is actually catching the set waves (often times, the are plenty of beginners who are hanging out closer to shore, so there is no reference to assess the size of the waves).

In Enniscrone that night, not only I caught many very nice, long right-handers, but I just can't begin to express how awesome the sunset was! On the left hand side, a big cloud covered the sun but let some rays through, softened as in a hazy morning. An intense orange color tinted that haze and the top part of the cloud. On the right hand side, above the summer houses, the cute white cotton clouds became dark gray at the bottom and bright orange on top. That lasted awhile. Then, as the sun continued to set, the cotton clouds lost any orange trace, merged into bigger clouds and remained gray. The left hand side was still spectacular. I wanted to stay in the water until dark, but I caught so many waves that my arms lost the strength needed to paddle and to push down the surfboard at take-off. I caught one more head-high, nicely peeling wave into shore, riding it smoothly up and down the face, watching other surfers paddle back out smiling at me: What a nice ride and what a nice session at Enniscrone.

Glendalough

Summer rain in Dublin and Sabadell

Looks like rain might be desirable in Catalunya, but wait!, today's low at 9º in Dublin?!

From my iGoogle weather gadget.

Spring-summer update

Yeah, I know, I haven't been posting much lately... I've been trying to spend my free time outdoors or socializing, rather than in front of my computer, since I've been quite busy at work : )

Since I last posted, I've taken some time off to travel and surf in California and Mexico and in early June I volunteered for Surf2Heal in Tramore, Ireland. That week I also moved from my apartment in Charlotte Quay with amazing views to Grand Canal Dock to a house in the very neat sea town of Dalkey.

A friend had offered her old car to me, but the transfer ended up not happening for different reasons. Now that I put the idea in my head that I would get a car, I'll probably buy one anyway. I need freedom to travel to the West in the search of waves : )

The move to Dalkey

Starting my day in a quiet and beautiful place like Dalkey is great. I'm quite settled in at this point, although I still need to get a small piece of furniture for my room, a clothes rack to dry my clothes inside and shoe rack for the house.

Dalkey has some amazing places within just 5-10 minutes from my house. Walking 5 minutes to the NE, you get to Bulloch harbour and a pebble beach. From there, you can see Howth and the East end of Dublin. Walking about 6-8 minutes S of my place, you get to an incredibly cute little harbor called Coliemore Harbour. From there, you could swim to Dalkey island --that's how close it is to it. The first time I walked there it was sunny and the water was calm and of a bright turquoise color. The harbor was empty, but I guessed i'd would only fit a handful of small boats. I continued walking on that road, following the coastline and, in just a few minutes, I got higher up on the hill and was breath-taken by the views across Britta's bay. It was just a little after 6am and the sky was clear, the sun shining on the flowers that filled every spot of the coast that hadn't been built up on. I knew I was close to Bono's house, and I understood why a rich and famous musician would want to live there! : )

More about Dalkey is to come in future posts.

Highlights of the last few weekends

July 23-25

Friday: Socializing

- TGIF: Food, drinks and relaxed conversation with colleagues.
- Paul's farewell drinks at Scruffy Murphy's.
- House-warming party at my old place on Charlotte Quay : )
- The MOST INCREDIBLE experience I've had in Ireland so far!!! This needs a paragraph of its own!

Not knowing the train schedules, I walked back to Trinity College from the house-warming party in order to catch the NiteLink. I slept through the bus ride until Dun Laoghaire, where I realized I didn't have my house keys. I got off in Dalkey and texted my housemate, hoping that my text message would wake her up and I wouldn't need to knock on the door at my arrival. She didn't reply, but as soon as I screecked the gate open, I heard my name from across the street. She was at a neighbor's trying to top up her phone credit to reply to me!

I was tired but accepted her invitation to go to a local pub, where her friend was at the moment. Oh my god! As we walked in, we didn't hear loud drunkard conversations but sweet singing voices! A bunch of 45-65 year-old men, a handful of 25-35 yo and three women sang beautiful songs with a Guinness in their hand.I was truly impressed by the singing skills of the people in the pub. And yes, they had a few beers at that point, but they were singing real songs, not drunkard ones! I had a real Irish experience, just like that, because I forgot my house-keys at work :)

Saturday: Trip to the West

- Headed West to surf in Co. Sligo with Marcus. Strandhill.
- Beautiful pre-sunset at Strandhill.
- Jazz concert with David Lyttle Three feat, Soweto Kinch (GB) at Tobergal Lane Cafe, on Sligo International Jazz Festival.
- Accommodation: We stayed at the Harbor House hostel (Sligo). Very friendly staff, huge self-service kitchen, linen includes towel, but no breakfast included.

Sunday: Surfing, Music of the World, Cinema

- Early session at Strandhill (pix by others)
- Dun Loaighre World Cultures Festival. It was great! I walked around streets and parks, checked out the market with food and crafts from different countries, bought music CDs, listened to Irish traditional music, watched a very nice parade formed by cultural group of differente backgrounds...
- Baraka at IFI.

July 17-18

- Surfing in Co. Sligo with two wonderful people, Karin and David. Enniscrone and more.
- Surf conditions were just alright by the time we got there, but we still had two fun sessions at two different spots that weekend.
- Accommodation: We stayed at the Railway hostel (Sligo), a very conveniently located youth hostel run by an extemely friendly couple. It has a computer with wi-fi and free cereal, milk, tea and coffee.

July 10-11

- 1 milion heads at a demonstration in Catalunya to claim respect of our people's decisions.
- Balkanarama: fantastic Balkan music live show at the Button Factory (Dublin).
- Spain won the soccer World Cup with mostly Catalan players.

Respect our people!

This blog post in English (by Miquel Marzabal Galano) summarizes why last Saturday more than 1 million people demonstrated on the streets of Barcelona. Want it or not, Spain is giving us more and more reasons not to be with them.

• Following is the beginning of a letter I really liked:

"Letter to my friends in Spain 

Dear friends, 

I would like to share with you a feeling, though I'm sure you are already familiar: in Catalonia are sad, deeply disappointed and, of course, also outraged.

I know you are many and many of us want to Catalan, which I like to come to Catalonia that you feel well treated here and, even, I like to talk in Catalan may understand but not always. I know you are many and many who respetáis our national feeling, but not what you share.

To all of you to say that the Constitutional Court ruling is an unprecedented turning point and determine a before and after our relationship with the entire Spanish State. It is sad and should never have happened. The statute was drafted and voted in the Parliament of Catalonia, then refined in the Congress of Deputies (which hurt us deeply in Catalonia), and finally was ratified overwhelmingly by referendum, even if for many represented a lesser evil.

[...]" 

(Original text in Spanish, click on "In English" to read in that language)

• This article about the demonstration on Saturday starts:

"A human tide of more than a million people has swept the streets of Barcelona.

Led by the present and two previous presidents of the region of Catalonia, the huge crowd came to express its anger at a Spanish Constitutional Court ruling trimming Catalan self-rule." (Includes video)

I'm proud of my people. I'm glad that people from different colors and ideologies in Catalunya are now bonding together, realizing that what we have in Spain is not a pure democracy. Glad they are speaking up.

Great weekend!

Thank you all for the good times we shared in Kerry!

Check out my set of pictures of the trip on Flickr.

2010-04-02 20.49.19, originally uploaded by martapiqs.

3 sessions in Kerry

It's Sunday evening, and the wind has been hauling since about 11 today. It might be it for my surf sessions this week, but my Easter trip is not quite over yet!

Today I didn't surf, but it was nice to hang out at the beach and relax at home, have lunch with my roommates and take a little walk in the afternoon. We also had a couple individual reading sessions were everyone was reading their own thing (paper, book, magazine), chatting about it every now and then. After some rest and snacking (berenar), we are now heading out to dinner at the pub, and then a fancy dress party, theme E! I'm Easter decoration.

Saturday I had a great time with Úna. We had a nice and slow start at the house, and ended up with a fully packed day! While we were checking the surf at Dumps we got a report from another beach in the Brandon bay nothing was working due to the wind. Given the direction of the wind, L. suggested we head toward the tip of the Dingle peninsula to find more secluded spots, or spots that would get offshore wind. Exploring new land sounded like a good plan, and if we couldn't find waves, we would still enjoy the visit of what we heard was a beautiful area.

We crossed over to Dingle on Connor pass on what was a windy and foggy morning (videos). We left Dingle behind and continued on R559, a loop road that takes you along fantastic places. We were amazed by the views and kept repeating ourselves that the drive was worth it, despite being longer than expected. At the edge of the mountain range, where the land meets the ocean, the road was narrow and winding, and the weather miserable.

I tried taking pictures from inside the car, without much success. I then stepped out and took a few shots, while U. stayed in the car, and I think I killed my Nexus One with the rain :(  Later on the sun would come out and would make the scenery look even more amazing. From that view point, I spotted a perfect looking wave and a beach with lots of white water. We drove over to take a closer look at it. We were before a gorgeous little beach at the bottom of tall cliffs in front of the Basket islands. U. said she wasn't going to surf because the white waters had no power and the waves were too fast for her, and she was happy to walk around and be on her own while I surfed.

OMG, I had my best waves of the weekend, practically on my own, in that paradisiac secluded beach. Two guys were out but they weren't doing much. I changed, did two sun salutations, paddled out and caught a fantastic right. It was long and it had power: so much fun! After that first wave, the conditions started to change and I shifted over to the rocks by the cliff, to try and catch the wave breaking further to the right. I noticed there were two different swells, and because of the incoming tide, waves were becoming less consistent. I caught another fantastic wave, and only another couple of okay ones.

The sun was coming and going throughout the session, the color of the water turquoise. In spite of the small number of waves I caught, the setting, the quasi-solo surfing and the quality of the waves made that session the best session of my trip. U. had a good time watching the surf, walking on the shore and chatting on the phone. I got out of my wetsuit and we continued our route.

We then stopped at the Interpretative Center of the Blasket islands, which focuses the life in the islands, and Gaelic (Irish) language has a significant weight in the center too. Quite a few people used to live there, they had a school and everything, they fished and farmed. A video showed one of the younger kids to have lived there until the age of 5, and he recalled that they had everything they needed, but it was a solitary place and the weather was very rough --they sometimes had to stay home for a week at a time because the strong winds would have just blown out the house door had they opened it. They moved away from the islands at the beginning of WW2. The center is located in Dún Chaoin.

We had lunch at the cafe of Louis Mulcahy pottery studio and shop, looked at the art, and continued our route. We crossed through Dingle, bought produce for dinner, and headed back on Connor's pass, where we stopped to climb up to a little lake near the road. The sky was very clean now, with clouds flying passed by, letting the sun shine every now and then. The scenic views down to the valley were now incredible.

We got back to the house and cooked dinner for everyone, including roast beef (for them), roasted veggies, caprese salad and apple pie with ice-cream (dessert was from Frank). We hang out at the house a little longer and headed to the pub for a drink or two.

On Good Friday I'd surfed Inch reef, a famous spot that can get really good and form perfect right-handers that roll down for over a minute. It wasn't working great then, but there were some waves to be had.

Inch reef and the spot I surfed seem to be very tide-sensitive: when I got to Inch reef it didn't look great --two of the guys went out and caught a couple of waist-to-shoulder high rather fat waves, but that was it for quite a while. The good side of it is that there were only a handful of people out. Then the push of incoming tide and possibly the swell we were expecting kicked in and it started to look much better. I decided to go out and a bunch of locals arrived --of course, they knew when the wave would be at its best! Some went out before me, and those who arrived just after I'd made my decision to surf got ready at the same time I did. I let them go first on the complicated path down the cliff, which involves muddy stretches and a rock climbing section that you can do grabbing a rope. I followed them on the rocks to get out. The rocks were very slippery but I made it without breaking my board, or my head.

Paddling out from that angle was easy if you timed it right. I let the first wave go for one of the locals to have it, and I waited for the next set. I caught a nice-looking over-head wave, started going right, but unfortunately it closed out on both my sides, so I had to go straight for another couple seconds, until it broke behind me. It was exciting because it was massive, but it didn't last long... I jumped off my board trying to avoid being dragged by the white waters too long, but I got caught inside anyway. I duck-dived many waves in a row and I was continuing to get pushed down; I realized it would be very hard to go back out paddling at that point, so I caught some white waters to go back to the rocks at the bottom of the cliff and I walked back to the starting point (if you can call rock skipping 'walking' :)

I only caught one nice long wave, powerful but not too steep. I rode it for a while and pulled out when I had to. This time I came back out paddling with no problem, but soon the wind picked up and chopped the surf, plus the incoming tide started to make it less consistent. I got cold and went back in quite satisfied after a challenging session in a well-known spot.

We got back in time for another surf on the north side of the peninsula, but I was tired and plenty satisfied with my surf in Inch, and the evening session wasn't very promising wave-wise. I went back to the house with Gearoid, stopping at the grocery store in Castlegregory (thanks!). We had a super nice dinner prepared by Judith, and Don and company let us know that they were having a party at their house. Most of us headed over there but I was super tired! To my relieve, Conor said he was very tired and achy as well, from the session at Inch reef :D My roommates wanted to come back early too, so we drove back together, to get some sleep before the next session on Sat.

Easter surf trip

We are staying in Fahamore, near Castlegregory, in Maherees, Co. Kerry. It's so beatiful!!! There are several peninsula-like points, and you can drive along, with water nearby on both sides. Dry long grass on the side of the road... so cool! :)

The drive down here was very nice. Mostly sunny, and beautiful views. Hardly any traffic because we left before 2pm. I got a lift from Marcus, and I really enjoyed it.

Checking the surf at Dumps

When we were in the vicinity, we went straight to look for surf because sundown was approaching. We surfed nearby, surrounded by snowy mountains and moving dark clouds, and we caught nicely peeling waist-to-chest high waves under a gorgeous sunset.

It was dark when we finished changing and we took off at 9:15, starving! We went back to meet with the rest and found our houses. Dropped stuff off and headed to the pub. More and more people joined us at the pub, as they were arriving from their cities at different times. Since it was the night before Good Friday and it is forbidden to sell alcohol in Ireland on Good Friday, the pub closed at midnight (last drinks call at 11:30), so we continued chit-chatting at Marcus, Florian and Paul's place.

First light, Sunday

First light, Sunday, originally uploaded by martapiqs.

Waiting for my surf buddies to come pick me up this morning.

Killiney hill

Killiney hill, originally uploaded by martapiqs.

Recommended!! Killiney Hill: 360º scenic view from Howth and Dublin down to Bray. The views from Killiney hill are gorgeous and people know it, because it was almost as crowded as Las Ramblas (ok, I'm exaggerating because my view of what is crowded has changed since I've become an adopted Irish).

The top

Dalkey, Howth and Sandycove



Dalkey island



Bray bay

I headed down to the DART station cruising down from Killiney hill. When I was about to buy my ticket, a voice let me know on the speakers that "No bikes are allowed on DART". WTF!!!!!!!!!

I had to cycle back to Dublin!! Of course, the weather changed in a couple of minutes: it started to rain (while the sun was still out). But Ireland being Ireland, the rain stopped a couple of minutes later, and, although the ride back home was a bit painful (my legs are not used to this much cycling!), the atmosphere was clean and crisp and the sun shone incredibly beautiful through dark clouds :D