Confluence

Confluence
www.commonground.org.uk

Wednesday 1 August 2007

connemara - chonamara : Letterfrack.

this post will be needfully short, as I spent most of my internet money on trying to make the "@" key work so I could sign in... sticky shift...

so we're in letterfrack (leiterfraic), Connemara, County galway! Five hour bus journey to get here but worth every moment, as we're now officially in the middle of nowhere, which is where we like to be. Camping in the garden of a big hippy hostel - low security but the best breakfast (scones, porage, buttermilk bread...) you ever did dream of. it's something of a shame that my sleeping bag, and gloria's phone, were stolen yesterday, but we have moved on unscathed, I think!

sorry if this blog becomes preoccupied with food, by the way. i'm swimming and being outdoors a lot, I'm beginning to dream about dinner...

on the last bus up the windy hill on monday, past many lakes, puddles, inlets and the like, we met an excitable french chap, name of Alex, who is working in a local b&b. he's an engineer from toulouse, and he decided he wanted to swim with us! so, after attempting to differentiate between the various european hippies staying here, and the various european hippies working here, we got the tent up and headed down the hill to the sea loch to meet him. the water wasn't as saltily buoyant as Dublin Bay, but without such strong tides it was much easier to make headway. we played and splashed and tied bits of kelp around each other. language barriers - and automatic barriers between new acquaintances - soon disappear in the water.

yesterday was the day of the Great Bedding Heist, so after climbing Diamond hill, our first tame little peak of the trip, the afternoon was concerned with dealing with the garda, leaving little time for swimming - you'll be pleased to know, however, that we made time for a stout before bed, and that's the really important thing...

which brings me, at the end of this badly-punctuated ramble, to today. This morning, after a broken night (rain noisy in tent) we headed out on a little ramble. we left the footpath and scrambled through bog and over rocks for a mile or so - stop shaking your heads! we know we shouldn't, but there are big paved trails and boardwalks and PEOPLE everywhere, we had to escape... and we came upon a river. Quite shallow, but very strong. yellow from the peat (pete?) in the hills, but clean enough for salmon and freshwater mussels - again G wouldn't let me cook them - so clean enough for us. now, we had, very cleverly, left our towels and swimming gear behind - we thought we were just off for a walk, afterall - so we had to find a secluded spot... we're getting used to this lark! we bathed where it was about waist-deep, getting clean as we could 9hostel showers : cold drip). and swimming against the current - I understood, suddenly, how it feels to be a hamster!

This evening i went for a long swim out across a part of the sea-loch (lough?), with Gloria as my spotter. About 800 metres, warm and smooth to begin with, getting colder and harder as the wind got up...

Right. We're off to the pub. Stay tuned!

J.

xXx

1 comment:

Majeed Neky said...

I like blog. Swim well!