Latest news with #Maharees
Irish Independent
14-07-2025
- General
- Irish Independent
‘If you find this please call us' – Canadian couple plan to visit Kerry beach where their message in a bottle washed up after 13 years
The story of the bottle's Atlantic crossing has attracted global attention, with CBS News and the Washington Post picking it up. The note, written by Brad Squires and Anita Moran (now Squires) during a romantic picnic on Bell Island in Newfoundland, was discovered by Kate and John Gay while walking along a beach on Scraggane Bay near Castlegregory. Thinking it was litter, the couple picked up the wine bottle tangled in seaweed, only to find the note tucked inside. It read: 'Anita and Brad's day trip to Bell Island. Today, we enjoyed dinner, this bottle of wine and each other at the edge of the island. If you find this note call us.' Kate Gay, who found the bottle, said she is amazed the story has generated such attention across the Atlantic. 'I think it's this idea of the bottle being so resilient,' she said. It barely leaked – there was no damage to it, no chips, cracks, nothing 'First, it had to survive the cliff it was thrown over. Then since 2012, there have been a series of really violent storms, there were big vessels on its route, but it survived it all. 'It barely leaked – there was no damage to it, no chips, cracks, nothing.' Over the past week, Ms Gay had the chance to speak to the Canadian couple during appearances on Canadian TV and radio. When they wrote the message, they had been dating for a year and were in a long-distance relationship, as Mr Squires was a police officer in British Columbia and Ms Moran was training to be a nurse in Newfoundland. They had taken a ferry to Bell Island from St John's, and had decided to get a piece of paper from their car and push a note inside the bottle at the end of a picnic. ADVERTISEMENT Ms Gay said the couple now plan to visit the Maharees in Kerry next year for their 10th wedding anniversary. 'I'm sure they will be going and seeing where it washed up,' she said. The day she found the bottle, Ms Gay was hosting a meeting of the Maharees Heritage and Conservation, an environmental group that had organised the beach clean-up that led to the discovery. 'I thought it would be a really fun thing to open the bottle when other members of the team were there,' she said. After a few failed attempts to tease out the note with tweezers, they had to break the bottle. 'A little tap of a hammer and it came out,' she said. When they called the number, there was no reply, but once the group posted the story on Facebook, it went viral within hours. Friends alerted the Canadian couple that their note had been found. 'I've spoken to them via a radio show and a TV show,' Ms Gay said. 'It was really nice to hear their voices, fill some gaps, and they sound absolutely lovely, and just can't believe the reaction themselves. 'But also can't believe that the bottle even made it beyond Bell Island, because there are steep cliffs there, so the bottle first had to negotiate getting over the cliffs and away from the rocks, which it did, and spent 13 years finding its way through storms and currents to the shores of the Maharees.' Ms Gay said the couple married in 2016 and now have three children. 'When it was all coming to light, their phones were just pinging. They were just putting the kids to bed, and just wondering why their phones were so active,' she said. While the bottle took more than a decade to drift to Ireland, the internet tracked down the couple within hours. The Maharees, where the bottle was found, is a 5km sand tombolo separating Brandon Bay and Tralee Bay, one of Ireland's most vulnerable coastal communities in the face of storms. We just thought it was a gorgeous story Parts of Newfoundland face similar challenges. 'We just thought it was a gorgeous story,' said Martha Farrell, chair of the Maharees Conservation Association, who was at the meeting when the bottle was opened. 'Kate is on our Coastal Resilience Project, and she finds it and opens it during one of our coastal resilience meetings. And guess what, Anita, who sent the bottle, is from Prince Edward Island, which is basically the equivalent of the Maharees in Canada.' At the meeting where the message was read, Ms Farrell said they mooted getting in touch with other coastal communities around the world, unaware that the story of the message in the bottle would go viral. She said the series of events have been full of serendipity. 'The bottle got here in one piece, the couple are still together and got married,' she said.
CTV News
10-07-2025
- General
- CTV News
Newfoundland couple's love note in a bottle found 13 years later on Irish shore
A bottle containing a note from a Newfoundland couple is shown on a beach in southwestern Ireland on July 7, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Handout - Kate Gay ST. JOHN'S — A romantic message in a bottle thrown from the cliffs of an island off Newfoundland nearly 13 years ago was found on a beach in Ireland this week — and the couple behind it are still in love. Brad and Anita Squires had been dating for about a year when they decided to end a quiet September picnic on Bell Island in 2012 by casting a message out to sea. 'Today we enjoyed dinner, this bottle of wine and each other on the edge of the island,' Anita wrote on a piece of lined paper before stuffing it into the bottle. Brad stood up and hurled it into the waters of Conception Bay. 'I gave it everything I had,' he said in an interview Wednesday. 'We didn't see it hit the water, it was too high up … I just assumed it smashed on the rocks.' It didn't. On Monday afternoon, more than 3,000 kilometres away, Kate and Jon Gay found the bottle on a beach on the Maharees peninsula along the southwest coast of Ireland. They broke it open that night with members of a local conservation group, who then posted about the letter on Facebook. Bottle message A bottle containing a note from a Newfoundland couple is shown on a beach in southwestern Ireland on July 7, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Handout - Kate Gay In less than an hour, Martha Farrell with the Maharees Conservation Association was reading a text from Anita Squires confirming she and Brad were now married with three children. 'And then I said, 'Yay, love conquers all — and the Atlantic Ocean!'' Farrell said in an interview. 'It was unbelievable, because we didn't know what had become of this very romantic couple,' she added. 'Our project is about coastal resilience and climate adaptation. And we were wondering, is this love story, is this romance resilient? Would they still be together?' Brad and Anita Squires were in a long-distance relationship when they had their picnic on Bell Island, which is about a 20-minute drive and a short ferry ride northwest of St. John's. He was a young police officer posted in British Columbia and his future wife was training to be a nurse in Newfoundland. They were married in 2016, and they have two teenagers and a young child. 'We were young in love and now we're older in love,' Brad Squires said Wednesday. Farrell said the crowd at the Gays' house made a toast to the Newfoundland couple after reading the letter. Later, across the Atlantic, Brad and Anita Squires toasted the group in Ireland as they shared text messages with Farrell. 'Anita and I both feel like we have new friends, and we're all equally amazed,' Brad Squires said. He and his wife will celebrate their 10th wedding anniversary next year. The Maharees Conservation Association, co-founded by Farrell in 2016, is also celebrating its 10th anniversary next year. 'I guess we have some people to visit and a trip to probably plan,' Squires said. This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 10, 2025. By Sarah Smellie
Irish Times
24-06-2025
- General
- Irish Times
Fending off coastal erosion: one Co Kerry community's story
Knowing that in a matter of minutes a storm surge could mean something close to obliteration of the place where you live makes people think differently about the best way to respond to an uncertain future. This is the case in Maharees in west Kerry. Knowing the odds are stacked against you, what can you do? They have completed that soul-searching process and are acting upon it. It's a realisation that will soon confront hundreds of small communities around the Irish coastline, who will need to decide how they respond. Rather than giving in to doomism, a remarkable form of collective action can emerge if the right approach to community engagement is adopted, says Maharees Conservation Association co-founder Martha Farrell. It's about being frank but not dictating, balancing self-education with expert input. 'We're giving it our best shot. We're not magicians. We can't turn back sea-level rise [but] we can make it as liveable for people as possible,' she says. READ MORE The Maharees is like a large 'Y' separating Brandon Bay and Tralee Bay. The 5km-long tombola – Ireland's largest – is described as a bar or finger-like spit. It is, in effect, the community's only protection, Farrell says, and yet its most fragile asset links offshore islands located at the top of the Y. Marram grass, which they have planted extensively, stabilises the dune system and yet is fragile: 'It can be destroyed by just 10 footsteps'. It captures wind-driven sand. Chestnut fences meanwhile, stretching 800m to the west and in parts to the east, designate beach access routes and prevent grass from being trampled. As if that is not challenging enough, Maharees has a unique ecosystem created and constantly changed by wind, rain and sea. It is home to Ireland's largest amphibian, the natterjack toad. It is at the heart of a special area of conservation. Tralee Bay is an important breeding site for critically-endangered species such as angel sharks and white skates and an-EU designated special protection area for birdlife. They are in 'a living lab', Farrell says. But its vulnerability was becoming glaringly obvious, and the association emerged from this. The sea side was being lost and human activities – raves and parties in the dunes, 'wild parking' – were accelerating its demise. Over the winter of 2015-2016 the only road in and out of the Maharees peninsula was impassible on 17 occasions as raging seas threw up vast amounts of sand. Visiting on a sunny June day, its beauty and fragility is evident with large numbers of holidaymakers, watersports enthusiasts and day-trippers. A survey in August 2019 recorded 23,040 cars travelling the narrow Maharees road in one week. Group members are at Magherabeg Cut, having completed a beach clean. They stumbled across a nesting ringed plover and are concerned beach users will encroach. Locals Janne Spillane and Zoe Rush at work on the sand dunes. Photograph: Domnick Walsh Polite 'please keep off dunes' have given way to more blunt signage: 'Sand Dunes: They protect us! Let's protect them ... no wild camping.' Aerial photos show this has been successful. Maintaining the dynamic of the dunes is critical, Farrell says. It requires wrestling with evolving processes of sand erosion and natural deposition. Seaward facing dunes are in constant battle with the sea. And yet Marram planting and fencing is now revealing growback to levels last seen before human influence. The conversation began with two questions. 'We asked the people, 'what do you value about the place? What do you want the future Maharees to be?' There was no mention of climate change. Our vision came out of that,' she adds. Through an alliance with Creative Ireland and local development agency the Dingle Hub , the Neart Na Machairí project has brought their efforts to the next level. It has embedded creativity 'to help rethink behaviours and take action to ensure the Maharees is well-adapted in the face of climate change and biodiversity loss', says project designer Zoë Rush – neart being Irish for strength. Chestnut fences designate beach access routes and prevent Marram grass from being trampled. Photograph: Domnick Walsh Three artists – 'creative practitioners' – Emer Fallon, Silke Michels and Zoë Uí Fhaoláin-Green – help facilitate a creative and collaborative exploration of the future of Maharees. This will inform a community adaptation plan that will benefit many others directly facing the prospect of 1m sea-level rise this century. It has got strong backing from State agencies (particularly the National Parks & Wildlife Service); Kerry Co Council, academics and NGOs. 'Coastal resilience requires an integrated approach, drawing from deep place-based knowledge of these habitats and the customs and traditions of people who live within them, [with] expert guidance and collaboration with State agencies to support and incorporate community visions of change within strategic and financial planning provided by Dingle Hub,' Rush says. 'This is far more than artists just listening to communities and then illustrating their needs,' she says. It is working closely with 'a conservation group who have such a good connection with the people'. A steering group of four conservation group members was enhanced by locals from different sectors, going beyond the 50 people out of a population of 300 already active volunteers. Through intensive circulation of information and invites to events, 10 'community partners' were added; people ranging across tourism/hospitality; watersports, farming, fishing and long-term visitors. The first year was 'a climate learning journey', bringing in different experts with knowledge on habitats, ecology and coastal erosion, explaining risks to the community and 'how they make those decisions that will then affect their long-term prospects', Rush says. After a year 'all the community partners said, 'it's great listening and learning all this but we want action'.' Informed by workshops, the project was rejigged. Long-term visitor Mairead Kinsella wanted to share learning in a flyer for other visitors, Airbnbs and local businesses. This is not a typical 'come and visit this lovely place' guide. It represents a creative response to the unique biodiversity of the region and its vulnerabilities to climate change. It encourages visitors to consider their role in preserving the natural beauty and ecological integrity of the places they enjoy; the essence of regenerative tourism. Association chair Aidan O'Connor praised her contribution at a launch event in April: 'She listened to our story, learned about the challenges we face due to climate change, and created something that supports and uplifts us.' The Maharees in Co Kerry separates Brandon Bay and Tralee Bay. Photograph: Domnick Walsh Farrell says it's about sharing their identity: 'showing we are doing this already; you can go here, you can go there and learn about this place with us.' They want sustainable tourism as it is the lifeblood of the community, whether that's camper vans in the right place, people coming to their holiday homes or surfers in September – but not gentrification. Striking the right balance is endlessly challenging, not to mention the vulnerability of local heritage to climate change and need for resilient local food supplies. Farrell highlights the precarious location of the graveyard where her father's remains are buried. It is on an exposed mini headland beside a 13th century church looking out to Oileán tSeanaigh with its ancient monastic settlement. A total of 22 groups have visited their area seeking guidance. 'Some are looking for the magic wand but it's really about persistent graft, raising awareness and networking.' Yes, there are fears about runaway climate change, but what is more immediately scary, Farrell says, is working out how they can buy a rundown schoolhouse so it becomes their 'community resilience hub'; a place for people to gather and a haven when extreme weather and power outages strike again. After all, this is a group of committed volunteers 'with just 21 binoculars and a fold-up tent' in their possession.
