July 2nd - Fourth of July, Day 18 - 20. Woke up early in my little cave spot to be on the water and it was a surprisingly still morning/afternoon. Some lovely caves and rocks to be seen. The copper coast has been gorgeous, it’s the majority of the Waterford coastline that is made up of volcanic activity from 460 million years ago. It’s made up of these stunning twists and turns and huge flat slabs of rock and you can just visualize the lava flowing into straight tubes and it eventually mixing and bending with shale creating these amazing structural cliffs. It’s called the Copper Coast because of all of the copper mining in the 19th century and because the sedimentary rocks of 370 million years ago are made of sandstones and siltstones that have a deep red and brown color.
Now I’m paddling through these incredible caves that open out at the other side and it’s just such a feeling to be around a bit of turbulent sea on the outside and then time it right to get into one of these caves to sit and float and it’s dead still inside. The moving water makes the back of the cave gurgle and moan, there’s a deep moss growing on the walls and sometimes birds make a call to alert others in or outside. Then there’s the opening at the other side to paddle towards and squeeze through to be out in the wind again. Just miraculous, this is really it.
I paddled across the bay past Youghal to Knockadoon to fill water for the day and use the bathroom and met Liam, the harbor master for a fair amount of smaller harbors in county cork. Very interesting and sad the stories he told me about the RNLI launching lifeboats and putting rescuers in danger. Told me a story of men going out on a boat they had just bought, with no lifejackets, navigation or anything and got lost in dense fog. Lifeboat couldn’t find them, so coast guard deployed the helicopter to do a heat scan from the sky, finally found them but when trying to land back at the pad, their instruments couldn’t quite locate it because of the fog. They decided to land on the Tramore sand flats but accidentally tipped the high point of the flat and rolled it. All were killed.
He also told me of the tragic Iron Man triathlon last year in Youghal, where 2 people died when getting in the water for the swim. From the perspective of the harbor master:
Why was the sea so bad? Why weren’t officials worried about the weather? Looking at the forecast a couple of days before, Liam who knew what weather was coming tried to cancel the event. He said to organizers “this harbor is open facing towards the swell and with the big waves that will come in, it is just going to swallow up people and hit them against the walls of the harbor. This event is not safe to be done out of this harbor and I won’t allow the severity of what could happen, to happen” as he was responsible for what went on in the harbor, he deemed it unsafe. So now he had the mayor at his door, the officials and all the rest. Instead of cancelling the event, they decided “ah we will just move the ramp to the beach, it is public property and out of Liam’s area of say”, so they installed the ramp on Saturday. The sea well tore it away and dislodged it that night. Maybe a bad sign.
As they looked at weather forecasts they also didn’t take in the elements of high water, and rain. Liam said, it had been raining for days before that, and what happens when all that run off comes up into the high tide - people don’t float as well in freshwater. So as swimmers piled into the waves, as the water was curling down and under, after hitting off the ramp and ricocheting back, swimmers were being sucked down when the two waters met just off shore. He described it as people who were fitter than you’ll ever be, were able to run into the water and dive under the oncoming set to avoid it, but what they didn’t realize is the wave would bounce right back. He saw people dive successfully, just to be slammed from the back, forward into the water. All of the sudden, all of these people are trying to swim in the water, and realizing the severity of the situation, started clinging onto the safety kayaks being hit broadside. At the same time the rescue rib boats couldn’t come in close because it was hard to see swimmers in black wet suits with only some wearing brightly colored swim caps. In one of the official videos, you can see in the top right corner, the lifeguard post with a red warning stating “no swimming”.
It was really an interesting story from the man himself who tried to prevent it from happening.
I got into Ballycotten, sorted my things in the lifeboat station and then went to have a coffee nearby. It was so lovely to just sit and look out at the water and relax. I stayed with Karine and Fergus in their beautiful house with a calico kitty. Always appreciated to sleep inside.
Karine and I went food shopping, to get a coffee from her friends coffee truck, and on the Fourth of July we went to the Ballymaloe house which was good fun. Had a nice walk around and coffee and cake in the cafe. Walked around the fine art exhibit too.
