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Dun Balai

Date: Aug 2010
Submitted by: Iain Miller

Hailing from the distant shores of Seattle in the good old US of A came Noble Brother Richie Khanna. 

 "I would like to climb above the sea." echoed the sentiments of an E-mail detailing splitter cracks rising high above desert sands and horror offwidths with "The Valley," far below.

 And sho, we went to play.

 Went to Glasha to test the sea legs of Brother Khanna and on a mill pond type day paddled over to the wee beastie residing there and spanked "Nature Always Provides" and "The Internal Grin." An exshellent morning was had with no hint or sign of our beloved Neptune! HURRAH!

 Nipped across to Cruit for a wee play on Torboy Island, Brother Khanna leading the way up two further new routes on this normally difficult/tetchy to access island. 

 And sho, after a day of detailing the trials and tribulations of how to conduct ones self in the shadowy world of baby dingy access, on mill pond seas, Brother Khanna had a moment of perturbment as he pondered "What all the fuss was about?"

 And sho, we went to Tory. :-) 

 We had several cunning plans for our day trip to Tory and as we made the ferry crossing through the non violent 6 footers from the SW, a day in the domain in the mighty Neptune was most defo on the cards.

 Booted our way to the East end of the island a nano second after arriving on the island and sorted the toys, inflated the boat and stood in quiet contemplation at the task at hand.

 Set sail from the superb storm beach to the North of Port Doon harbour and paddled the 500m out into the deep. Neptune was in attendance and giving the base of the monster cliffs a bit of a kicking as we turned North and paddled a further 200m to the land ward side of our stack. The location of this beast is in a truly "Oh Fuck" location at the base of the 90m sea cliffs that guard access to this outstanding badboy.

 Richie jumped out the boat onto a tiny wee sub stack islandette on the landward side and crouched as the rollers threw them selves over his howff. I paddled back into the channel and observed the maelstrom in attendance. A tad of nautical shenanigans found my good self on the West end of the beast over looking our stricken hero on his nautical prison and with a tad of ML ropework (all be it "in extremous") we were re-united on the massive non tidal platforms at the West end of the beast. 

 The stack was climbed up it's seaward face, the rock, location, atmosphere and general sense of well being were in the upper stratosphere of being truly fackin alive. A stacked multiple abseil and we were once more on our safe haven of monster non-tidal platforms.

 A tad of further nautical shenannigans and we were sea borne again! HURRAH! A paddle though the massive sea arch/cave enroute and with a brief visit from the resident bull selkie we were once more back on terra firma.

 Another superb day out was had, if one was to look UBER close at the attached pic, the "clowns on the stack" can be clearly seen.

 Donegal sea stacks are simple the gift that keeps on giving! :-)  


Photo of Route