Why bother ??

"A site about currachs" you might say. "Why bother ??". Have a read of this then and come back..
The people that lived with and from these boats were great people and these are great boats.

The Quilty Currach Building Course

Well, 3 Aran-style 3-hand currachs were built and launched on August 15th 2004 in Quilty following a 6 day course given by Padraig O'Duinnin from Meitheal Mara. Details, photos, measurements, and course accounts can be seen here.

Excerpts from the book "British Coracles and Irish Currachs", 1936

In 1936 a fine gentleman, named James Hornell, wandered around the coast of ireland documenting the various types of canvas covered boats being used at that time. His book is, in my current knowledge, the most comprehensive description of Irish currachs/naomhogs and is worth the read. Since Mr. Hornell is gone to the great currach in the sky I've taken the liberty of transforming the chapters pertaining to Ireland ( thanks to Donal initial copy of the book ) into PDF format for your perusal right here. Its 3Mb in size so don't try this unless you have a decent internet connection or time to spare.

The Absolutely Ultimate List of Currach Links

• Meitheal Mara, the top men and women down in Cork who teach currach-building/racing/eating/drinking/sleeping. The fundamentalists of the currach/naomhog fraternity, these people believe in the holistic healing power of boats. They might be right.
• West Clare Currachs a community based currach/canoe building group who have built 4 canoes over the course of 2005/2006 and are currently racing/training.
• The plans and materials used for building the 3 aran style currachs
• The Lough Neagh Boating Heritage Association are busy at it and have a good site to go with it. Very good details on tarring boats in general
• The Naomhoga Chorcai rowing club, based in Cork City seem busy at the rowing, no building going on apparently./

Drawings of various currachs taken from the book "British Coracles and Irish Currachs"

• I have extracted the drawings from the Hornell book mentioned above which can be seen here. There are drawings of Achill Island Currachs, Aran Islands Currach, Donegal paddling Currach, Iniskea Island Currachs, Kilkee Currachs & Ross-a-dilisk Currachs.

No point having a currach site if there isn't at least one photo

This one was taken at the launch in Quilty, August 15th 2004.

By the way, Mark wasn't asleep, just meditating on the rhythm.

Things to do

• Take the photos of the materials/plans and translate to text and clearer graphics
• Get measurements for a West-Clare canoe, maybe the one Michael Falsey has outside his house.
• Get info/photos about the seasamh-seol, the mast-fitting for fitting a sail.
• Get info on the thing that can be hung off the stern when using a sail.
• Get info on the best kind of currach trailer available, specifically look for ideas which would allow one person to launch a currach.