On Man Lab and Coracles
Nov. 15th, 2011 09:31 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
torkellI never quite realised just how small a coracle is. One of the segments in today's Man Lab had them build a coracle, and then row it across from Torpoint to Antony Passage. It's a surprinsingly simple construction, and it only took them a few hours to construct one. May then somehow managed to row it across the channel without it sinking or capsizing.
So why am I posting about it? Well, my dad's side of the family comes from Northern Ireland, but if you go back further in the family history you end up over in Scotland, as an offshoot of the Gunn clan. But how did they get to Ireland? Well, the tale goes that one night a few centuries ago, two brothers rowed across the sea in a coracle. And it's all very well reading about coracles in Wikipedia, but it's not until you actually see one being constructed and used (even if it's only on TV) that you realise just how amazing it is that the two brothers managed it.
So why am I posting about it? Well, my dad's side of the family comes from Northern Ireland, but if you go back further in the family history you end up over in Scotland, as an offshoot of the Gunn clan. But how did they get to Ireland? Well, the tale goes that one night a few centuries ago, two brothers rowed across the sea in a coracle. And it's all very well reading about coracles in Wikipedia, but it's not until you actually see one being constructed and used (even if it's only on TV) that you realise just how amazing it is that the two brothers managed it.
