This is a day to celebrate the wild resources of the undersea as you engage in hand-diving and cooking your very own seafood in this most minimal-intervention, sustainable, natural and respectful method of finding food. Explore the rocky Irish Atlantic in search of delicious wild crustacea, bivalves and fish amongst many other wonderful delights of the seashore. A fantastic way to truly connect with the ocean as you hunt for and cook your lunch from the wild using only natural methods.

It is important to observe animals in their habitat, connecting us to the landscape through their eating. It adds value to your food, and is the epitome of understanding provenance as you selectively take them from the wild. This is a day to learn how to respect nature by falling in love with it again, as a whole new respect for it is established with this traditional approach to feeding yourself directly from the landscape, and in doing so, we become it. To learn to cook them well, over a roaring fire or bubbling pot of boiling seawater from the beach where they were caught, is to discover a truly autonomous connection to the sea.

THE SHAPE OF THE DAY

09:30 - 10:00 THE BEACH

(Weather Dependent) Meet at Traharta Beach for coffee and tea around the table in the canopy tent. There will be a short presentation about the importance and joys of learning how to find food from the shallows and seashore, what to expect to find underwater, marine biology and techniques of how best to take from the wild successfully and responsibly.

10:00 - 10:30 DIVE PREPARATION

We discuss in-depth the different tools and equipment needed and safe diving technique for successful shallow diving. This includes mental preparation and breath-work for safety and efficiency.

10:30 - 13:00 THE DIVE

We will cover the fundaments of free-diving, the backbone of diving and spearfishing. You will be individually guided in the water, where you will duck dive for your catch, diving in up to 5m of water, and successfully bring and foraged food back. to shore. This is the first true introduction to diving and spearfishing*.

13:00 - 14:00 PRACTICAL COOKING SESSION

If the weather is bad we will move on to the Booley for the next part of the day

Enough wild food is selected for lunch, with any excess returned to the water or stored in a bucket of fresh seaweed for you to take home. A fire is lit on the beach, and your crabs are cooked in seawater, and fish on the fire.

Moving to the table we learn how to break down the spider crabs into its respective brown and white meats, retaining shells for broth making, enjoying the communal mess and a glass of something delicious

14:00 - 15:00 LUNCH

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EXAMPLE MENU

Foraged shore-crabs deep fried in dripping and seasoned with fermented wild garlic

Traditional open-crab sandwich with home made bread and country butter, wild greens

Hot Smoked fish from the barrel with potatoes, sea beet and butter

Bisque

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14:00 - 15:00 Farewell Coffee

Bellies and hearts full, it’s time to share coffee round the fire before heading home, onto new adventures!

PLEASE BRING:

Westuit (required), mask, snorkel, wetsuit shoes, fins (optional), waterproofs, walking boots/wellies, water canteen.

If you are unable to bring any or all of these items, please contact max@uptherethelast.com.

*NB In this initial course we are looking at free-diving basics which lead to foraging underwater on the day. Although we will look at and handle a speargun, the actual underwater use of one will be for a separate advanced level course which is in development.