If you're the kind of person who likes Bars, Nightclubs, Restaurants, and lots of shops to visit and browse - Portavogie is definitely not for you.
But if you like honest, hard-working people who do whatever it takes to get the job done - without all the fluff of modern living that you are likely to find in a city or large town - then maybe Portavogie is for you.
Everything is here is just raw, from the pier to the people - It's just a really real place - no BS here, at all...no one here has time for BS - there's work to be done...
There's a fuel station that doubles a small food store, a cafe, a restaurant, and two fast food places (chip shops) - and that's it, no high street, no tourist shops, nothing like that at all. And I like that.
All too often these smaller places get hijacked by tourism and turned into a cartoon theme park of overpriced goods, with endless gift shops selling stuff no one needs - this isn't a place for tourists - or even yachts for that matter. When I called this place to see if I could stop here for a few days the Harbour Master was on holiday and I got another chap who was managing affairs on his behalf and coming in was no problem, but later learned this was not the usual practice as this is a busy working harbour and, in the past, yachts have been damaged - and that caused problems for some boat captains that were already struggling to make ends meet. One particular story I heard was of a scratch below the water line to some fancy guy's yacht, and he went all out to get money off of a boat captain to have his fancy yacht hauled out of the water and professionally repaired - it was/had to be settled outside of insurance so as to not affect the Fisherman's insurance premiums and, quite frankly, this really hurt this particular fisherman financially.
These guys work really hard to earn a living, and they fight for every dollar they earn - the last thing they need is some millionaire 'fancy lad' standing on them to get a scratch fixed because of an accident, so I get why they try and keep private yachts out of here.
I, myself, don't care about a small ding or scratch - to be honest - I already have a few of them that the boat came with...in here - it's a risk you take, but the captains I saw - were some of the most skilled I have seen anywhere - moving these huge boats around the confines of the harbour like they were toys - just incredible skill. I can't imagine accidents of that nature are too common, but it just takes one 'a-hole' to mess it up... In short - I felt really privileged to be here, in this environment, with these people.
On the pier, life is very different from that of a marina where you just plug in power and just get water with ease, Here that's just not possible - at all - just getting on and off the boat is an exercise in parkour, it's not for everyone - but I loved it.
As to power, we've got the ability to make our own. We can run the engine to charge the batteries, which we don't like doing - but when I bought this yacht, I thought while I still had some money - I figured that buying a generator would be a good idea, and we don't really use it all that often, but in places like this it really becomes a useful thing to have, and means your not too dependant on running lines to the shore to try and hook into some kind of powerpoint.
There was power on the pier, but the connections were of a much larger industrial connection type that we just don't have, we would have needed some kind of adapter - which we also just don't have - so I hauled out the generator to top up our power - it's not that loud, actually it's quite quiet for a generator - but Chloe did not like it at all - she did get used to the sound and eventually plucked up the courage to go on deck while it was operating - but did spend a good bit of time observing it before making her move...
The harbour was bursting with all kinds of sea life, hundreds of seagulls and other types of sea birds...and then there were the seals. Now, when I was stuck in Eyemouth when Scotland got locked down for a few months, I, at night, would occasionally hear the seals making a strange noise - but the seals here are loud, at all times - even a 4am you can hear them shouting at each other.
I tried to get some audio one night, but every time I pushed record - they would just go silent....but then I was just sitting in the cockpit one day and they just started their shouting and was able to grab some footage on my phone just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about...
Taking a walk down the harbour one day I counted five very fat seals...here, they're very well fed, so well fed in fact that they seem to have a strange relationship with the seagulls.
In the picture below - you can see a seagull standing on one...and the seal doesn't even care - In Eyemouth - the seals would go for them - they did not like them at all, but here, there is plenty to go around so they tend not to fight with each other...
Walking a bit further down the harbour I was able to grab quite a few more shots of these seals. They really are big fat things - very well fed indeed.
Again, they just don't seem to mind the seagulls here at all, they tend to hang around the seals to get any scraps that they don't eat. I watched them as they would dive down, get a fish and only eat the best, fattest bit of meat - and throw the rest away to the gulls. Like I said - plenty to go around...
This went on for hours, dive, get fish, eat a tiny bit, dive get a fish.....and so on.
When I came back hours later - they were still doing it...
The seals would come near the boat every now and again, and the cats were not fans of the seals - they seemed very perplexed with these seals...
They would sit for hours just watching them with a mixture of interest and confusion at these huge noisy beasts - I know they know other things live in the water, but these fellas really piqued their curiosity...
The girls did really did pay a lot of attention to them, whenever they came near - they were under constant surveillance by the crew...
The last time they saw seals was back in Eyemouth, Scotland - but as I mentioned - these seals were very loud...
Chloe was the one who was most affected by the seals, she really didn't like them!
She was barely able to mask her contempt for these beasts...
But Portavogie is really dedicated to the fishing industry, and to the fishermen themselves. Almost everything in this place has connections to fishing.
I'm told, that what you see here in this place is nothing compared to what it used to be like, evidently, at one time you could've crossed the entire harbour just by using the fishing boats as a bridge - it used to be stuffed with as many boats as the harbour could hold! If I thought it was busy now - it must have been something else years ago!
I can't imagine how busy it must have been here at one time, everywhere you look there is something relating to all the fishing that goes on here, it's just an incredible little place.
In a way, I'm not surprised, these men are just impressive humans - and the work they do is very dangerous - I don't think enough people really appreciate how dangerous it is, here, they are held in high regard, and rightly so - I feel.
And although they are tough and hardened by the sea, after discovering I wasn't a typical yacht owner and was not a threat, I found them to be as kind and generous as anyone anywhere. They were keen to pass on tips about the weather and passage making in the Irish Sea.
They were also keen to help me make repairs to my yacht by offering tools, supplies and anything else I needed - I didn't need any help, but it was very kind of them to offer their time to a complete stranger.....it says something about them as humans.
The harbour itself was just an interesting place with fishing gear all over the place in various stages of repair and disrepair...boats being worked on, to boats not being worked on - Nothing goes to waste here, everything can be fixed - and put right back in service.
When we got here the weather was pretty rough, but the harbour looks pretty different in calm conditions... but the rocks still retained their menacing look, I really don't like those rocks.
It was just an interesting place to have a wander around, just something going on in every corner of the place...I think if you lived here you could easily get used to it all, but for me - it was just a fascinating look at another facet of life in another place that you never really get to see and given most yachts just pass this place by, or are not welcome, I feel, it was a real treat to see this place.
I also met a few of the 'foreign' workers - I say foreign but not in a derogatory way, I just mean these were men from far-flung places who were working on fishing boats, most were working to support their families back home - wherever that was. I met a few from Ghana, one chap called Godwin, was as cool a guy as you could ever want to meet, but his boat wasn't based here in Portavogie, he was just visiting so to speak. His boat was based out of Campbeltown, a place we visited very briefly before we came to Ireland.
Godwin loves Scotland, he loves the way they talk, and act, and is basically in love with Scotland and everything about it, and although being from Ghana his English was very good, I suspect he will try and stay if he can, and I hope he does. He has been fishing for about 18 months and wasn't super happy about being in Portavogie, Ireland - He just wanted to get back to Campbeltown, Scotland! Wherever he is now I wish him the best - such a cool dude!! I really enjoyed speaking with him.
There was another group of workers I came across, referred to as 'the Indians', but I heard at least 3 languages amongst this group, not sure where they were all from, but I found them all behind a fishing warehouse having a very high-spirited game of cricket.
These guys were having an absolute blast, just the most incredible fun. Using fish boxes as markers on a makeshift field.
I, myself, don't play or understand cricket to any degree that would amount to any understanding of what was actually going on with the game, but it was fun to watch these guys just having a great time in their off-time.
Later that night, in the middle of the night - all of a sudden, the harbour sprang into life.
These massive fishing boats that were all sitting quietly, suddenly fired up their engines and began to make their way out to sea.
It really is something to see a perfectly quiet harbour transform into a hive of activity.
With boats coming from all directions and all perfectly maneuvering around other boats including our little yacht, one boat passing with a few feet of our stern...
These boats continued to dispatch all night - It must be a tough life going out for days or weeks at a time, being away from friends and family just to earn a living.
And with the government constantly changing the regulations, the situation, as I understand it, is more political than practical - it's all very confusing - and probably very frustrating for all involved. But here, it's all hustle and bustle...I even saw this little boat heading out in the morning after the long line of big boats had gone out...
And on this morning I happened to be on my personal Facebook page and noticed something in my newsfeed. An old friend of mine from school had posted that he was in Newcastle having a caravan holiday - At first, I thought, what a shame he's in England, I was going to give him a shout to see if he wanted to meet up.
Then I remembered, there's a Newcastle in Ireland as well, quickly checking my charts - he was, in fact, in the Irish Newcastle - I quickly dropped him a message to see if he would be interested in arranging a meet up as Newcastle wasn't too far away, but also I was to be heading in his direction, so we could maybe meet someplace closer to him.
Within an hour or so he had messaged back to say that he would be able to meet and that he and his husband were soon to be on their way to Portavogie! I wasn't sure how long it would be before they would be here, so I decided to check out the beach to the South of the town to kill some time as the crew wasn't up for being on deck as the seals were hanging around making a lot of noise...so, off I went to the beach.
At the north end of the beach, there were just a few flies...
Luckily they're not the kind of flies that bite you, there were just an awful lot of them! But the beach itself was really nice, about a mile and a half long with all kinds of birds - all feeding on something in the shallows...but it was just a nice surprise to have this little beach to walk on right next to the town.
No beach houses, no ice cream stands, and no other people - and very quiet, with nothing other than the sound of the waves lapping at the shore...although the birds were making a bit of noise as I approached, it's not the kind of noise that's unpleasant...it was sort of a surprise that this beach existed just 1000 feet away from a busy harbour filled with industrial equipment and the near-constant rattle of diesel engines...
