Crom Castle and the whole Crom estate is well known as a wonderful recreational facility. Providing facilities for boaters as well as campers, Crom Castle also have pods as well as apartments to rent. The whole thing lends itself well to a good relaxing holiday experience. We headed out from Belturbet with Marion still suffering from a bad cold and you’ll notice her voice on the video is somewhat husky!
Given that the summer of 2018 has been one of the best on record it comes as no surprise that we enjoy more lovely sunshine on this trip. Crom castle and estate has been compared with Lough Key forest park and it’s a fair comparison too.
White Island should be on the top of you boating bucket list, it’s a marvel to see. Close by is the old RAF base of Castle Archdale. During the second world war Catalina and Sunderland seaplanes set out from this Lough Erne base through the Donegal Corridor and on out into the Atlantic where they hunted down German U-Boats.
Catalina & Sunderland service dock in Castle Archdale on Lough Erne
From the pics opposite you can see how the aircraft would have fitted into the service dock like a hand fitting into a glove.
We also take a look at Boa Island and the Janus figure. This was an ancient Celtic idol. It is a two sided figure with a male and female face standing back to back. Now getting to Boa Island on lough Erne by boat is a little difficult because there is no landing jetty in the island. We were lucky enough to be able to arrange a lift from nearby Castle Archdale. Boa Island is connected to the mainland by a bridge.
In the background you can see some of the caravans from Castle Archdale caravan park.
In the pics opposite you can see the clear out line of the aircraft that would have moored here to get repairs or general maintenance work done.
There is also a barge anchored just to the left of the service docks. It’s a pity about the algae bloom in the water at the time. The westerly wind blew a lot of the algae into this bay which just added to it.
As far as we are aware this is the only remaining
RAF Castle Archdale Catelina & Sunderland service dock
example of such a dock in Europe. In the video we inadvertently referred to the refuelling jetty as the last one but this is the one we should have referred to. Hope you enjoy the video.
