Tag Archives: New years eve

By John Galvin IN what is becoming a New Year’s Eve tradition for me, I headed for North Clare to meet the RNLI’s Joe Queally and others to walk the shoreline at Fanore. Our destination was the deserted village at Loch an Uisce, which was abandoned in the early 1900s. Up to a few weeks ago, I wasn’t even aware of its existence but from the 1820s, there was a settlement of around 14 families right on the shore. They survived by farming, labouring and, of course, fishing and I’m sure it was a hard life. They eked a living by bartering with Aran Islanders, who often traded with them Poteen, obtained from Connemara. The islanders swapped this to obtain essential supplies of turf, vegetables and other goods that were hard to come by. Sometimes the sea was so rough that the currachs were barely able to land and had to return immediately. In these cases, the Poteen was left …

Once you reach a certain age, New Year’s Eve should be spent in front of the telly, watching whatever rubbish is on, but sometimes you want to do something completely different. This New Year’s Eve, I found myself in a car, heading for Fanore in the company of Joe Queally, RNLI stalwart and Dave Courtney, a former Coastguard helicopter pilot. Our mission was to climb Sliebh Elva and light candles for the souls lost at sea and for our own families. Even leaving Ennis, the rain was coming down but by the time we hit Fanore and joined Doolin Coastguard, Tom Doherty and his partner Celine Kennedy, it was coming down like stair rods. I confess, I wasn’t well prepared. I forgot to bring my waterproof trousers and had to borrow a pair from Tom. My boots weren’t best suited to the conditions either. I really needed wellies to properly deal with the lakes of water that flooded the trail. …