south west ireland and donegal

the most expensive purchase i have made for my kitbag this year was buying a campervan, specifically a vw california. Along with my friend, i have wanted one for some time but found it a massive commitment to make. John my pal, decided to go ahead and get his while I looked on with some envy. so earlier this year i finally took the plunge and found one that met my requirements, automatic, 4 wheel drive and green! i jest about the colour, it could have been yellow with pink spots and I may well still have bought it. the 4 wheel drive though was essential for venturing in to the highlands of scotland in winter.

so having laid out some considerable cash on the campervan my wife and i decided that our main holiday this year should make use of it, so we headed to a part of ireland we had never spent any time in, west cork and kerry, booking a couple of nights in a hotel half way through it in case the campervan wasn’t working out… our first stay was near bantry in west cork. the proximity of it to the beara peninsula being of key importance. i had bought the book “beara” by kenmare based photographer norman mcloskey and was impressed immensely, its a fantastic body of work. i hadn’t made plans for many locations in the area as i often find myself trying to cover too much.

one place i wanted to head for was allihies to photograph the rock formations situated by the atlantic. choosing the best night of the 3 we had in the area was key as it coincided closely with high tide. a long exposure allowed me to form graphically the strong circular movement of the aquamarine water in this natural bowl, that coupled with a soft sunset pallet was a wonderful scene to witness.

our next stop was in killarney and the lake Hotel. It was excellent, didn’t do much photographically other than a little trip to the torc waterfall which just happened to be a few minutes from the hotel.

We moved on from Killarney with the intention of staying on the ring of kerry. however we opted to go further north to the dingle peninsula as there was a couple of coastal locations I there that was keen to photograph, Coumeenoole beach and dunquin harbour.

after we spent a couple of nights on dingle we headed north up the coast towards mayo, I had always wanted to shoot dun bristle at downpatrick head. I had no idea however how terrified i’d be standing 6 feet from the edge of a 120ft drop.

we only planned the one night in mayo and it wasn’t a bad thing, my father in law always said it was a wet place and that was about right. rain didn’t let up after we photographed at downpatrick head. So we headed north to donegal in the morning as planned. staying at elaine’s mums house in donegal is a great base for exploring the county, though I often return to familiar spots, such as fanad, falcarragh beach, portnablagh but also going to new places like ray (pronounced rye) church as recommend ed by my friend Tom O’Donnell.

Fireballs 2020

well that didn’t go to plan…