Ireland to Iceland 2017

05/10/2017

Into The Great Wise Open!!!!

27/09/2017

Stayin Alive!!!!

14/08/2017

Howaya Folks

Along our travels on the high seas we met some amazing people as we made our way from Killybegs, Donegal to Port of Seydisfjordur on the east coast of Iceland. While we were docked in Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis in the outer Hebrides we bumped into Andy Schell and Mia Karlsson of 59 North Sailing. Here they interview John Owens and Paul Rogan of "Ireland to Iceland 2017"

Andy & Mia are professional sailors, writers and photographers and offer yacht delivery, various sailing related workshops (including Celestial Navigation) and sailing expeditions throughout the year. Andy also hosts the 'On the Wind Sailing Podcast', a regular show where he talks to sailors who are living their dreams on the high seas. Signup for the '59º North Newsletter' at 59-north.com/news to get the latest on what's going on and for exclusive content.

I have just listened to this podcast and it's mighty. In my defence Foxy and I did go shopping and we also went for a lovely Indian meal and yes we had 2 pints aswell to settle ourselves from the night before. All these tunes and pints, oh and sailing would knock it out of ya! This is also my very first podcast to listen to, I had to get Andy to send me on a link as I couldn't figure out how to listen to it. So basically it's like a online wireless, is that the craic?

#202: Johnny Owens & Paul Rogan are 2/6th of the ‘Ireland to Iceland 2017’ crew whom we met on the docks in the faraway fishing town of Stornoway in the Outer Hebrides. Their gang of merry sailors were on an adventure to the Arctic in a 40-foot steel ketch, Johnny’s father as captain, makin...

10/08/2017

More of Djúpivogur as I can't figure out how to add them to the last post. This was the lovely encounter I had with the Icelandic pony, so tame and Anna's camera skills make it look like something innapropriate! Hahaha too funny!

10/08/2017

Here are a few pictures from my first day hitch hiking down to the beautiful town of Djúpivogur in Austurland in eastern Iceland. It is near the island of Papey on the fjord Berufjörður.

The first day hitching was a tough one as I honestly didn't know what I was getting myself in for. I was going to meet my friend Anna there so it was a nice way of easing me into it. I never would of hitched hiked at all only for I met her at LungA Art festival right after my Karaoke debut of Elvis Presley's "Blue Suede Shoes" (I can still hear Rogan and Foxy in convulsions laughing at the side of the stage shouting "go on taffy" and me going ape-sh*t, I swear it was the best laugh ever) Anna said she had hitched there from a small town about 4 hours away to the festival and that she has hitched in loads of countries before and it's the best fun. Have you ever hitch hiked before? No I said and to be honest I'm not sure I would? Is it safe? Yea completely and it's so much fun! It didn't take much convincing and after I found out that we weren't sailing Martha Jane home I said, right that's it..... I'm staying on and I'm going hitch hiking for the craic. Well I had a few moments of one minute I was going, the next I wasn't then I wasn't sure what I was doing but I packed my bag, grabbed the fiddle and left a note for Johnny as he was sleeping I didn't want to wake him, I tried once or twice but I hit the road to go off hitching!

I remember walking out of Seydisfjodur that morning, taking in one final look as I turned the corner with Kaffi Lara, where we had so much fun during our time there, a final glance and walked out of Seydisfjodur for the last time.
I passed another woman hitching, she was working at a guesthouse where all the musicians were staying and needed to go into town shopping, I walked on passed her so as she would get the first hitch. I sat down on my bag and cars passed but none stopped, it always puzzled me when campers would pass with loads of room and just look the other way haha. After a short while a car pulled in and picked up the woman who was hitching before me and drove by me and then stopped, almost unsure a little, further up the road, score.... my first hitch, and he was Icelandic too. A few people said it would be mostly foreign tourists that will pick you up. It actually worked out the opposite with Icelanders taking the lead, sure they couldn't refuse one of their own! I got as far as Egilsstaðir and from there I hitched a lift with an older man, in a 97 Toyota pickup with huge wheels and he dropped me 11km out the road to what seemed to be the middle of nowhere with no cars passing and the heat reaching high 20's but after about 15 minutes an suv with a trailor tent pulled in and picked me up and dropped me in Djúpivogur.

I went into the cafe and got a strong coffee and an apple muffin while I waited for Anna. We went hiking around the island, went to a modern art exhibition which was cool, introduced me to Skyrr Yogurts, went to the " Eggin I Gledivik" by the Icelandic visual artist Sigurður Guðmundsson. We saw the most beautiful coloured lighthouse I ever saw, and we could climb up to the top of it for a 360° view of the island.

We were going to get the ferry across to Papey Island but at 10,000 kronas (€100) and pre booking online for some ferrys it was too much hassle and too expensive! We went and got dinner then in the same cafe and afterwards went back out hiking again at night, simple over there as it doestn't really get dark. We hiked out to the most easterly point in Iceland, got lost a good few times, her fault of course 😂😂 and got soaked after hiking across some lovely soft soggy ground!! The colours of the sky were just crazy as you can see in some of the pics, I think we hiked until 2am or something. The next morning we had breakfast down by the harbour and I tried to make a plan as whether to keep going south, the most popular route or go north which is less popular and harder to hitch. After a lot of, yea I'll go south, no wait I'll go north, no south that's it. I even flipped a coin and it said that I was to go south but I went against the grain and headed north and I'm so delighted I did as I had the best craic and met the best people ever along my journey.

So only for Anna put the idea in my head about hitching I probably would of never have done it and just took a flight to Reykjavik and missed out on so many memories, experiences, laughs and good times, time of my life for sure. I hitched a lift out of Djúpivogur as soon as my bag hit the floor, before Anna even managed to get a lift (sorry missed your 'high 5' 😁) by two lovely souls from Finland and the drive back in the sunshine was just beautiful as the day before was misty and overcast and I couldn't appreciate the views.

Taffy

09/08/2017

Keep living the dream.

All the crew of and are back on Irish soil and this evening is my first Irish sunset as I have been busy playing tunes all weekend. There's only Martha Jane left to come home and she's on her way.

08/08/2017

Hows about this. Matt Molloy in Port of Seydisfjordur, on the east coast of Iceland following in our footsteps on his very own Icelandic Adventure.

Myself and Foxy played a few tunes in this Sound Installation about a week before Matt got there.

G'Wan Ireland ya boya ya!

08/08/2017

We are now at €880 from Freya and the beautiful yogis at Om Warrior Yoga, Mullaghmore. I highly recommend taking a class with Freya if you're in the area.

Thanks again 😁

08/08/2017

A walk through some of Reykjaviks "Street Art Tours" last Thursday on my last day in that beautiful city.

07/08/2017

Wishing I was back on the high seas, sitting here listening to the ocean crash against the rocks, getting soaked. Wesht is besht, the weather is beautiful here today.

07/08/2017

Here are some photos of our 108 sun salutations with Freya Elanor Lomax for Good 2 Talk Westmeath. We had a fantastic day with great freshly baked goodies afterwards. Wish every yoga class was like that 😁

Thank you Freya and your lovely friends.

06/08/2017

Ireland to Iceland 2017 had an amazing yoga class this morning with Freya Elanor Lomax at Om Warrior Yoga in Mullaghmore. With the whole trip and leading up to it I haven't been doing much yoga. Today we did 108 sun salutations which was over 2 hours of yoga. I have never done that many sun salutations in one session before and I was in a complete flood of sweat. I literally had to ring out my tshirt after class! I feel great after it and it was just what I needed after 5 weeks on the seas and hitch hiking around Iceland.

There was a great turn out at class and the support locally was unbelievable. We all went back to Freyas house for tea and cake. Freyas family, friends and yogis baked beautiful cakes, flapjacks and there was fresh water melon too, my favourite, and lovely locally grown fresh mint and herb tea. What a great bunch of people we got to meet and there is already talk of another 108 sun salutations for the 21st of December so keep that in your diary.

When we got talking about Good 2 Talk Westmeath and listening to different stories about sevices available in other towns, or lack of services, we don't realise how lucky we are to have such a great service in our town of Mullingar. Making awareness of this might get other towns to latch on and try set up similar services in other towns and cities across the country.

We were overwhelmed with the generosity of Freyas friends and family and after counting up all of the donations we managed to raise a whopping €750 for Good 2 Talk Westmeath.

We would like to thank Freya, and her family and yogis for such a great day in Mullaghmore. See you in December for another class.

Yoga for a longer life 😁