The navy-and-cream bow of the fishing vessel Heather Jane II, registration D 674, moored at a pier with green rope lines, smaller boats visible on calm water behind it and a village on the far shore.
Davey John’s Forge · Journal

Tied up at Downings, heading for Holland

A working crabber at the pier, and a conversation that took me straight back to being small.

I was passing through Downings the other day when I spotted a big vessel tied up at the pier. She turned out to be the Heather Jane II, D 674, a crabber. The crew were flat out moving pots and I got chatting to the skipper, Kieran McGee, for a minute. He told me they were heading away the following week, back to Holland, and that the pots were all going straight there too. He was decent enough to let me take a few photographs before he had to go and meet someone for a coffee.

It's a short walk from the village and honestly one of the better ways to spend ten minutes on this stretch of the Donegal coast. There is always something happening at that pier if you time it right. I remembered that as I stood there, because I also remembered standing in the same spot as a young fella, watching smaller crabbers come in. The McBrides used to pull in with their boats, a blue one and a red one I think, and they'd hand buckets of crabs and toes off the side. Nobody seemed very bothered with them at the time. Things were different then.

Two fishermen in yellow-and-blue waterproof bibs and blue rubber gloves carry lobster pots across a harbour pier alongside a tall stack of pots. A third worker in a red top is visible further back. Houses on a green hillside sit behind a harbour wall in the background under a partly cloudy sky.
The crew shifting pots on the quay at Downings.
At the pier

Pots, a forklift, and a quick word with Kieran

When a vessel that size pulls in, the work around her is something to watch. A red JAC forklift was working the quay alongside the crew, shifting stacks of pots. There were hundreds of them, a long wall of dark mesh and coloured rope, teal and yellow and red, lined up along the concrete. It is the kind of scene that makes you stop.

Kieran was easy to talk to. When I mentioned Davey John's Forge and that my grandfather Davey Graham had been down there for years, he knew straight away what I was talking about. That happens more often than you'd think around here. If you are looking for something to do on a quiet afternoon and you are staying with us in this part of Donegal, Downings is worth a wander. The pier alone will give you something to look at.

The full side profile of the Heather Jane II, D 674, moored at a wet harbour pier. A red JAC forklift is parked close to the hull and a fisherman in yellow waterproofs handles a lobster pot in the foreground. Stacks of pots sit on the quayside in the foreground and background under a bright cloudy sky.
The Heather Jane II alongside, with the forklift doing its share of the work.
The detail

Hundreds of pots, all bound for Holland

Kieran said the pots were going straight to Holland. I didn't press him on the detail of it all, he had things to be doing, but it was a reminder that fishing out of a small Donegal harbour is tied into something much wider than the bay. The scale of the gear on the quay made that plain enough on its own.

A long, close-up wall of stacked crab pots on a harbour pier, their mesh frames woven through with coloured ropes in teal, yellow, red, and blue. In the background, the superstructure of the Heather Jane II and a red forklift are visible, with a crew member carrying a pot.
Hundreds of pots lined up on the pier, bound for Holland.
Come and stay

If you fancy being close enough to wander down to Downings Pier on a whim, we'd love to have you.

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