ROVING WRITERSRóisín Ingle and crew quaffed champagne on deck, played cards in their cosy quarters, and crashed their boat on a regular basis - the perfect Shannon cruise.Photographs: JamesConnolly
There is a curious moment before you crash a 39-foot cruiser worth €250,000 into a stone pier at Dromad, Co Leitrim. It's a moment that is very still and very quiet and fairly bursting with anticipation. A moment when all you can do is stand at the steering wheel, watching and wondering. What will it sound like? Will the boat be damaged? Will the jetty be dented? And then the important questions: will the champagne be tipped overboard? And just how many wine glasses will smash?
Even though you know it's going to happen, when it does, it's a shock. The louder than expected ker-DUNK, the keeling over of the three-strong crew inside, the smashing of one (phew, the champagne is fine) wine glass and, of course, the staring. You get over the crash, but some time will pass before you forget the strange, Deliverance-style, staring business.
It seems there are two types of cruising folk. The first sort like to stand and stare as though watching a particularly compelling episode of Coronation Street when somebody crashes into a jetty, say, or happens to run aground on a pesky riverbank, more of which adventure later. In Dromad, an entire family gaped open-mouthed at us after the crash while the Handsome Skipper (HS - my boyfriend) panicked and dithered with ropes above deck. The First Mate (FM - me) and the Galley Hand (GH - my mother) were too busy panicking and dithering below decks to try and salvage the situation.
So thank goodness for the second sort of cruising folk, one of whose number suddenly appeared, striding along the pier the way people do when they are on a rescue mission. Gary or Gerry, we can't remember which, was literally all hands on deck, barking out friendly orders and generally calming us down. He waited until another cruiser had vacated the packed marina and expertly helped us manoeuvre the vessel into their space. He tied our ropes for us, gave us some desperately needed mooring tips. And even though he knew the red-faced FM had been at the wheel when the incident occurred, he didn't say a word about women drivers. We promised we'd buy him a pint later, but we never saw him again.
In fairness, we had only been at this cruising lark for 24 hours when we crashed. It had started gently enough the day before at Carrick-on-Shannon when we took possession of the boat at the Emerald Star office and were shown how to drive it and navigate our way through the black and red markers that are dotted along the Shannon/Erne waterway.
As we set sail, the HS, beer in one hand, wheel in the other, was thoroughly delighted with himself and wore an expression that usually only surfaces when he's eating hot chocolate fudge cake or watching Liverpool win. Meanwhile, the FM and the GH settled into the luxurious below-deck surroundings, which on our cruiser comprised three bedrooms, three showers, a dinky little kitchen and a comfy sitting room.
We were only going as far as the tiny village of Cootehall that afternoon. It was a gorgeous couple of hours cruising. Gliding through lakes of rippled glass, water flanked on both sides by elegant, swaying rushes, gulls hovering over the water as though held up by an invisible string. Waving at the crews of passing boats in watery solidarity. Time seemed to stand still. The real world was only across a few fields, but it felt like it was miles away. You couldn't help but start fantasising about living on a boat, forever. This, you think, as your ears fill with birdsong, is the life.
And then the jetty at Cootehall appears, and suddenly you have to think about mooring, and where should you go, and can you tie up your boat to those other boats, or maybe you should turn around and start again and oh jaysus the boat is drifting towards the bank and ... aaaarrrrggggh.
Yes, the FM was at the wheel this time, too. No, the HS and the GH were not one bit impressed. "You'd think you were on the dodgems," said the GH as she tried to compose herself, which is hard when the boat you are on is lodged firmly in the mud and won't budge, even when you try to reverse. "Everyone is staring at youse," offered two children standing on a boat on the other side of the river. And indeed everyone was.
But thank goodness, again, for the three strapping men Eoin, Eoin and Conor, who decided that giving us a tow was more useful than standing and staring from the safety of their own vessel. Without laughing too much at us, they towed us off the bank and tied us alongside their two boats, telling us not to be too hard on ourselves.
We were more than ready for dinner when we got safely back on dry land. And what a dinner. Mannfred's Restaurant is a cosy little place on the river at Cootehall which has a German chef, the eponymous Mannfred, and a charming German waitress/manager called Irmagarde. The GH devoured what she declared "the best wiener schitznel I've had since a school trip to the Black Forest in 1954" while the HC and the FM were equally thrilled with their dishes. And, as a bonus, Irmagarde told some excellent stories about her grandfather, who was a sailor.
Later, we rolled down to the Water Splash bar to buy one of the Eoins a pint and play a game called Killer Darts. It was early to bed though - the GH didn't think she could cope with climbing over the two boats to get to ours with any more than a brandy and ginger on board.
We awoke the next morning to a dull day and decided we would cruise on downstream to Dromad, negotiating both a scarily narrow canal and our first lock like professionals. Then we crashed into the pier, played cards, drank champagne and kipped before sailing back to Carrick the next day. None of us could believe how soundly we slept on board and we all felt utterly relaxed as we drove back home to Dublin.
And now some advice: go with more than three people because it's murder tying up all those ropes. Pack carefully, or you end up trying to hide from fellow sailors as you lug your 10 pieces of luggage off the boat, afraid they might say things such as: "were you away for two days or two weeks?" Practise the mooring part until you feel totally confident. Those big boats have minds of their own and as we discovered, it's not hard to lose control. Finally, and this is really important, if you see anyone else crashing, try not to stare.