Dublin to Arklow

We were hoping to moor on a pontoon right in the middle of Dublin but unfortunately it was impossible to reach as a new swing bridge was being built but didn’t swing yet. So we ended up in Poolbeg Marina, a 20-minute cycle from the city but right on the edge of the shipping zone. This was amusing at first but less funny
when we were woken at 3am by a huge cruise ship turning round (with the help of two tugboats) about 15 feet from our boat!



Anyway, it was a convenient base from which to explore Dublin. We took a tour on the open-topped bus, and couldn’t believe it when two friends from the Ardglass festival, who had moored in a completely different marina, appeared on the same bus.
They probably couldn’t believe it when they got dragged along with us for a tour of the jail, Kilmainham Gaol. It had been highly recommended by the bus driver and was actually very interesting, just an awful lot of information to take in. As our guide took us around the prison, he gave a series of lectures filling us in on the last 200 years of Irish history, the famine, the struggle for independence, the fate of the martyrs, (many of whom were put to death in this prison), and of course the appalling treatment by the Brits.



Katie was very patient throughout it all, especially as food had been specifically forbidden during the tour! One thing I had never realized was the significance of the colours of the Irish flag. The green represents for the ‘true’ Irish, the orange is for those Irish descended from the British and the white symbolises peace existing between the two.

So, back on the bus for some well-deserved snacks and the return trip through Dublin. We passed the statue of ‘sweet Molly Mallone’ and Dave was dismayed to discover that she was not just a vendor of cockles and mussels but a lady of the night. Or, as the driver put it, “the trollope with the scallops”. An illusion shattered!



We got a more agreeable tip from the driver about where to go for lunch. He pointed us to an old-fashioned pub, or ‘drinking emporium’, just off the busy O’Connell Street where we had a delicious meal at reasonable prices without the crowds. After escaping from the guilt of the prison, we had to relax with a pint or two… Here we parted ways with Dicken & Pam, who are sailing back to the Bristol Channel with their lovely pilot cutter, ‘Peggy’.

The next couple of days we wandered around at our own pace. We found busy shopping streets, quiet market stalls, street entertainers galore, beautiful old buildings, ugly new buildings and all the things you expect in a city. We visited the National Gallery, Dublin Castle and managed to break a smile from a harassed-looking waitress in the tourist area of Temple Bar. We crossed the river Liffey on the new Millenium Bridge and back over the old Ha’penny Bridge (much more elegant).

Ha’Penny Bridge

There was a lot of building work going on, particularly on the north side of the river, so lots of cranes, dug-up roads and scaffolding barriers, which I’m sure will be lovely when it’s finished. We got rather lost on our bikes and ended up the wrong side of a huge basin off the main river. Rows of restaurants bordered two sides of the water but we ended up at a dead end where somebody had set up home in a caravan right in the middle of the street, with kids toys scattered around the road. We had to drag the bikes across two sets of lock gates to get back to the main road to the marina.


Chloe came out to visit and after one last night among the throngs at Temple Bar, we set off down the coast to Wicklow. We had a good sail with the wind off the land, crossed one fleet of racing yachts near Dalkey Island and another further south near Graystones. Chloe did a great job at entertaining Katie, doing a 2-hour stint of painting at sea! By lunchtime, grey clouds had taken over the sky but in between showers we had great views of the coastline and the pointed peak of ‘Great Sugarloaf mountain’.



We had to dodge a colourful fleet of sailing dinghies outside Wicklow harbour, then went in and moored on the quay wall. The first thing we noticed were the paintings of ships the length of the harbour wall. Before long, a man on a bicycle arrived to say hi and he turned out to be the artist, named Pat. As well as being a postman (yes, Postman Pat), he is a ship enthusiast, and seems familiar with all shipping movement along this stretch of coast. He knew the name of the cruise ship that ruined our sleep in Dublin and often travels to nearby ports to see and photograph unfamiliar ships arriving.


Wicklow harbour with Great Sugarloaf Mt behind

Pat pointed us in the right direction for the town centre and we went to stretch our legs and treat ourselves to an icecream. Wicklow seemed a nice little town, with lots of stylish clothes shops, a vast selection of pubs and several Chinese restaurants, but we couldn’t find a bench to sit on and ended up eating our icecreams on a deserted doorstep!

Pat with one of his paintings

The forecast for the whole week was pretty uninspiring, winds between SE and SW and varying from moderate to gale force. There was a possibility of heading 15 miles down the coast to Arklow the following day but we managed to miss both the late night and early morning forecasts and so assumed the forecast of SW 5-7 that we had heard was still valid. (Our dongle for getting internet on board has gone from excellent to intermittent to not working at all.)


Instead, we took the train to Dun Laoghaire (pronounced Dunleary), where there was a Festival of World Cultures. There were rows of stalls offering foods from all over the world, but at a price – crepes for €5 seemed a bit steep, but we couldn’t resist the German pretzels or American muffins. Sadly, the rain came down in earnest just as lunchtime approached and we didn’t fancy sitting in the rain to eat African food, however authentic. Instead, we wandered into the town and happened upon a lovely little café that did us a fantastic lunch in the warm and dry.



Once the rain eased off, we wandered back and took a very excited Katie on the Ferris Wheel. This gave us an amazing view over the town and harbour, where a fleet of small boats were barely moving in the breeze. It certainly didn’t look like a force 5-7. Of course, this was the sheltered shore, but even so…! Anyway, the train didn’t go back until 7pm, so we had no choice but to re-immerse ourselves in music and watched a flamboyant display of Brazilian dancing.



The next day really was wet and windy. The harbour was sheltered from most of the wind but we could feel the boat surging in the swell and the lifeboatman’s opinion that “it’ll be dirty enough out past the headland” settled it for us. We had a last wander ashore before the rain came in, then cooked a roast chicken dinner before waving Chloe off on the train back to Dublin.

The next day, we headed out towards Arklow. Again, the winds seemed light in the harbour and just outside, but we only realized how much shelter we were getting from Wicklow Head when we got to it. It was blowing a good F5-6 on the nose and against the tide. The lifeboatman was right, it was pretty dirty! Olaf, at the end of our bowsprit, was well and truly submerged in the swells, and our topsail mast got bent up and broke. (Our fault for not lashing it better.) Two hours later, we arrived in Arklow and moored in the fishing basin. We will be here to wait out another gale before heading south to Kilmore Quay.