The Red Bull Cliff Diving event in Inis Mór Island

O evento da Red Bull Cliff Diving em Inis Mór, Irlanda

It is time for more Red Bull Cliff Diving! This year’s series already had a few jumps, and again this year one of the amazing stops was the Islet of Vila Franca, next to São Miguel Island, in Azores. And without realizing, I almost saw another jump but this time in Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, where they’ll jump from the historical bridge. Unfortunately I was there two weeks before the jumps.

Red Bull Cliff Diving

The competition takes place in several places around the world, is a series of dives in places that might change every year. This event is both for men and women as different categories, men dive of heights between 26 and 28 meters, which is comparable to a 8-9 store building high, while women jump of heights between 20 to 21 meters, more or less a 7 store building high. A bit scary, and even more when you’re there and you see how high that is!

Red Bull Cliff Diving - The Worm Hole
Red Bull Cliff Diving – The Worm Hole

The “pool” in Inis Mór really resembles a pool, a rectangular shape open rock with sea underneath. The event’s reception was a few hundred meters away from the sea, so we had to walk a fair bit before we actually could see the dive stage, with a fantastic view to Dún Aonghasa, a pre-historic fort. The pricing for the event was a bit odd, two different prices for three different areas where you could watch the event. I think we got the worse area possible, even though I don’t regret the money I spent to see it. It was a very pleasant experience and the day was simply amazing! So great, that I got a sun burn!

Inis Mór (Inishmor)

Inis Mór island is the biggest of the Aran Islands archipelago, on the west coast of Ireland. It isn’t hard to get there, but it isn’t straight forward either. To those coming from Cork, the best way is through Doolin port. To those coming from Dublin, you have direct ferries from Galway to the islands or a short flight of 20 minutes (if even that long).

The Red Bull Cliff Diving event in Inis Mór Island
The Red Bull Cliff Diving event in Inis Mór Island

Since we went from Cork, we took the ferry in Doolin, which took about 1 hour and a half with intermediate stops in two islands, the third and last one was our destination. Inis Mór. The travel was quite ok, with view to the amazing Cliffs of Moher, with the company of a few dolphins that followed us during part of the trip.

To those that enjoy a nice retreat, those islands seem to be the perfect spot! Internet coverage is quite weak, and in some parts of the island almost none. The permanent populate is also quite small, which makes that place even more quiet. Like almost everywhere in Ireland, people are really nice, however with a very bad notion of time and distance.

Dún Aonghasa
Dún Aonghasa

We almost missed the last ferry because someone told us that it would be fast to get to the port walking (about 20 minutes they said), a distance of almost 9km…, without internet for most of the time to help us having an idea how far we were, we almost had to spend the night over there…

Booking.com

The Aran Islands are also another nice detour from the Wild Atlantic Way. If you’re planing to visit Ireland, and it is part of your plans t do the Wild Atlantic Way, don’t forget to include these islands as part of your plans. Or maybe not, if the weather gets really bad…

By Gil Sousa

Portuguese expat in Cork, traveler and food enthusiastic.

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