Over the years, spinning for mackerel from the shore has provided me with either famine or feast. Somehow, fishing near Clifden Eco beach on a rising tide, I managed to catch but a single lonely fish.

What he was doing out there on his own I don’t know but I hope he wasn’t the last Connemara mackerel. Filetted and cooked atop the trusty Kelly kettle he was a very tasty morsel but Helen wasn’t too impressed with her hunter-gatherer.