I was lucky enough this weekend to have been invited down to Kerry, in the South west of Ireland to Aebhric and Anna O Kelly's soon to be opened Permaculture and Nature Awareness school. I along with four other members of the newly formed Irish Bushcraft Club had met Aebhric at a club meet the previous weekend and had been invited down.
As it was short notice we arrived at different times, some close to midnight, but Aebhric and Anna met all arrivals to give us the grand tour. They have been working tirelessly for the last few months to get the school up and running and we were to be their first guests.
This is a wilderness school in the true sense and the facillities reflect this.( this is a good thing by the way ). Anna who will be teaching the Permaculture side of things had built the composting toilet while Aebhric and his assistant Greg Sommner had begun work on the schoolhouse and other facillities.
We were shown a section of woodland where we could hang our hammocks and duly set about taming some of the wilderness to make room for our campsite. This gave us a great sense of ''real life situation'' setting up of a camp in a strange place in the dark.
Aebhric provided a fire pit in the schoolhouse so birch bark tinder bundle and firesteel got our cooking fire going. Once all had arrived and introductions were made we retired for the night.
After breakfast Aebhric asked each of us what we hoped to get out of the course and then catered the skills training to suit the group. We spent the day learning fire lighting techniques, including the bowdrill, we learned how to walk through the forest in the best possible way to get close to nature, learning how to ''see'' in the forest, and how to use all our senses when in the forest. This nature awareness side of the day was the most appealing to me and I will follow up on this with more courses with Aebhric.
At the end of the day Aebhric sent us off to find a ''sit spot'' and to record our time there. This again proved to be one of the highlights of my weekend as too many times I have just marched in to the woods, camped, carved and eaten without really seeing all there was to offer in just one small spot alone. I got to see the forest floor literally alive beneath my feet, and a bees nest in a spruce tree about ten yards from where I sat ( I had walked right past it on the way to my spot) amongst other things.
After a full days learning we ate our evening meal and Aebhric left us to chat around the campfire.
Sunday morning was spent learning tracking techniques with Aebhric and Greg. Before going out to look for tracks, Greg spent time going through the stages of tracking and then we headed out for a few hours practice. We got lucky and did have some tracks to identify and follow.
Our final lessons for the weekend came from Anna, who showed us how to make cordage and some basketmaking techniques.
All in all this was a very rewarding weekend for me and my classmates. Aebhric, Anna and Greg were patient teachers with an easy style which made learning a pleasure. I know that I for one will be returning to try out some of the other courses on offer.
Aebhric and Anna will be running many diverse courses throughout the year, from basic bushcraft right up to residential tracker programmes. They also run wilderness first aid courses and of course the permaculture courses. Check out their website for all details.
Note: I have no connection with the school other than having been on this weekend course.
As it was short notice we arrived at different times, some close to midnight, but Aebhric and Anna met all arrivals to give us the grand tour. They have been working tirelessly for the last few months to get the school up and running and we were to be their first guests.
This is a wilderness school in the true sense and the facillities reflect this.( this is a good thing by the way ). Anna who will be teaching the Permaculture side of things had built the composting toilet while Aebhric and his assistant Greg Sommner had begun work on the schoolhouse and other facillities.
We were shown a section of woodland where we could hang our hammocks and duly set about taming some of the wilderness to make room for our campsite. This gave us a great sense of ''real life situation'' setting up of a camp in a strange place in the dark.
Aebhric provided a fire pit in the schoolhouse so birch bark tinder bundle and firesteel got our cooking fire going. Once all had arrived and introductions were made we retired for the night.
After breakfast Aebhric asked each of us what we hoped to get out of the course and then catered the skills training to suit the group. We spent the day learning fire lighting techniques, including the bowdrill, we learned how to walk through the forest in the best possible way to get close to nature, learning how to ''see'' in the forest, and how to use all our senses when in the forest. This nature awareness side of the day was the most appealing to me and I will follow up on this with more courses with Aebhric.
At the end of the day Aebhric sent us off to find a ''sit spot'' and to record our time there. This again proved to be one of the highlights of my weekend as too many times I have just marched in to the woods, camped, carved and eaten without really seeing all there was to offer in just one small spot alone. I got to see the forest floor literally alive beneath my feet, and a bees nest in a spruce tree about ten yards from where I sat ( I had walked right past it on the way to my spot) amongst other things.
After a full days learning we ate our evening meal and Aebhric left us to chat around the campfire.
Sunday morning was spent learning tracking techniques with Aebhric and Greg. Before going out to look for tracks, Greg spent time going through the stages of tracking and then we headed out for a few hours practice. We got lucky and did have some tracks to identify and follow.
Our final lessons for the weekend came from Anna, who showed us how to make cordage and some basketmaking techniques.
All in all this was a very rewarding weekend for me and my classmates. Aebhric, Anna and Greg were patient teachers with an easy style which made learning a pleasure. I know that I for one will be returning to try out some of the other courses on offer.
Aebhric and Anna will be running many diverse courses throughout the year, from basic bushcraft right up to residential tracker programmes. They also run wilderness first aid courses and of course the permaculture courses. Check out their website for all details.
Note: I have no connection with the school other than having been on this weekend course.
