鄭立勳。常滿。Bountiful。Mandy Cheng: A day out

Showing posts with label A day out. Show all posts

Clare Glen hike

早上起來，終於跌破十度，卻是個難得大晴天，艷陽下溫暖舒服。

即刻行山去也，九月中開始下雨，河道回復滔滔流水，聲音雄渾宏亮，樹木綠葉仍在，尚未見秋意。

While out in the Shannon estuary area, visited this castle at Carrig island near Ballylongford. Built in the 15th century by a local clan, to be used as a stronghold for controlling the shipping lanes to and from Limerick.

It is bigger than normal Norman square tower, 4 floors high. The spiral staircase survived and can walk up to see the rooms at each floor and a grand view from the top, of the Shannon estuary.

Beautiful stone work everywhere, on the map, there are actually a few of this type of monuments along the estuary, all for the same reason, collect money from passing by ships.

Pulling razor clam

Went out on a low tide day to Littor bay near Ballylongford to try our hands on pulling razor clam. A beautiful day, blue sky, warm sun and a fantastic pristine huge golden sand bay, a pleasure to be there. Did not spot any holes nor many broken razor clam shells, probably not a good location anymore.
Anyway, got one big razor clam, clean well, changed brine a couple times and quick blanched, tender and tasty.

Glenstal Wood hike

In our search for good organic egg, with bright yellow/orange yolk and thick white, we went to Walsh organic egg farm 45 minutes away. Managed by the farmer’s wife, with 50 hens that roam freely on pasture, the egg is up to our standard.
By buying direct, we pay the same as in the shop, the owner earns more and that makes the work worthwhile.
To use our time well, found a good hiking trail nearby at Glenstal Wood, a walk in the mountain with a panoramic view of that area.

Ennystymon river walk

Join one of the Heritage week event at Ennystymon, a guided tour of the river where the upper inlet was polluted by a unregulated discharges 4 years ago. With a Consultant and local residents’ joined effort, via cutting down invasive and light covering Portuguese laurels and laid them down along the bank for wildlife use, the water quality and biodiversity have improved.

This was once a famous salmon river and old photos show how easily big fat salmons were caught along the bank with minimum equipment around 60 years ago. This year, the salmon counter registered 24 fish that came past. At this low rate, there will not be enough salmon to come back to this river in a few years’ time, a total collapse of the species.

Partial sun eclipse

八月十二日看日蝕，期望不高，因為一直有雲，時聚時散。

到六時左右，竟然在聚散中看到太陽慢慢消失、和開始重現的情況，太幸運了。

起初太光，得用pinhole viewer 觀看，往後光力減弱兼雲多，可以直接看到、兼用手機減光拍攝，氣氛奇幻。

人生第一看到日蝕，似個小朋友覺得好好玩。

Galway Hooker Race

The first time to see this event at Kinvara, a fun raising effort to maintain and encourage the use of these traditional sailing boats. They were important as cargo boats to transport goods to small towns along the long coastline and the islands. They are beautiful and glide gracefully on the water.