We arrived in Bantry expecting to stay for 4 or 5 days – but then some unusual Irish weather showed up – in the form of 3 named storms within a week! We decided to stay put – even taking a couple of days on a marina pontoon – since the new Bantry marina is very sheltered within the harbour… Winds forecast at over 50 knots came as forecast – but we were fortunate in our sheltered berth to see ‘only’ 43knots! It looked horrendous just outside the harbour – where we’d been!

We ended up staying in Bantry for 2 weeks, making the best of whenever breaks in the weather presented themselves, to get out and about and enjoyed a couple of nice walks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We took a bus ride over to Glengarriff to visit the famous gardens on the island of Garinish…

 

What a contrast now – a high has arrived and is sitting over Ireland and England giving us beautiful clear sunny and cool days. We had a cracking sail from Bantry down to Crookhaven and tomorrow we’re debating going just around the corner to Sckull, a little further to Castletownshend or a bit of a reach and go all the way to Kinsale… Since we’re no good at keeping to a plan, you’ll have to wait to find out where we ended up!

The only thing we’re missing is buddies! We seem to be the only cruising boat left in Ireland!