Fear and Loathing in the Nagles

Because we love you and promise to bring you

tales of adventure from across the globe, this

week we undertook an 8 day expedition to the top of Irelands most dangerous peak, Corran (also known as the deadly mountain of the goat beast) in the Nagles, probably the last true wilderness on earth.

Corran (pictured above right on a good day) stands at 7,453 metres and is on the banks of the longest and widest river in Europe, the Blackwater (picture below).

To get to the foot of the mighty Corran, we had to canoe across this waterfall so we tied ourselves together with fishing line and dropped pieces of bread into the water so that we could find our way back should we get lost (It's an old trick we learnt from a survival manual written by a german brother and sister who had problems with a witch who had a house made of cake).

Despite Kierans attempts to capsize my canoe by standing on my starboard, pulling out a shotgun, shouting "Peanut butter jelly time" and shooting at some giant trout, we made it across alive and well without too many problems.

Kieran with his gun:

And in action:

With a few Trout now packed up for lunch and with our safe arrival in the foothills of the mighty range they call the Nagles, we all stood in awe at the majesty of Irelands most famous rock walls. Over 4000 metres of glass smooth granite danger, grinning at us, as if daring us to challenge her.

You can almost smell the evil coming off her awesome yet hideous face.

Nerves taut, we began the approach to the beast you see above. It was a solid 6 hour slog through some of the worst terrain I have ever encountered (photos below) - made worse when Paul and Brian had to fight off the legendary devil faced goat beast when it came a little too close for comfort (we could feel something evil in the air for miles before the attack but we put it down to post trout flatulence).

The beast (right) trying to escape from pauls bag.

Below - Typical terrain of the Nagles and surrounding area.

And then, to my horror, we reached the face - Evil Incarnate. I could smell death all around and fell to my knees to pray for our souls - what were we doing trying to take this on just because you, our readers demand it - This really was madness.

The beast up close and personal. uuuuggghh.

Brian led the way, getting some good early holds considering how smooth the huge granite face was. 6 hours of battling with the mighty lump of evil later and there were just about enough securing points so we could set up camp (we had a lovely 12 man tent which we managed to set up like a portaledge) and eat our lovely 6 course meal (with candles and side plates) that Brians mum Elsie had lovingly prepared. Elsie's duck special and spuds were the finest any of us had tasted yet Donny only ate the sprouts, claiming some kind of allergy to all meat and potatoes.

Well fed, we continued up the last couple of pitches with surprisingly few problems, especially considering it was pitch black and we only had waterproof matches for light (which we strapped to our fleece hats once lit - a great short term lighting solution).

Anyway, that's about that as I am too tired to write anymore after all that activity and I feel we have done more than enough to keep you amused and entertained with this most recent adventure.

A bientot my little monkeys.