Connacht Tribune
Moycullen adventure park scales new heights
Set on 20 acres of forestry and woodlands beside a lake, Wildlands offers visitors a chance to try a range of high-octane activities to get their adrenaline flowing. Catering for all ages, it’s proving hugely popular since it opened in July. Siblings Faye and David Bohan tell STEPHEN CORRIGAN how this family enterprise evolved and about their ambitions for its future.
In 2018, when the Bohans broke ground on what they hope will one day be Ireland’s leading adventure park, they could hardly have imagined they would be opening its gates for the first time in the midst of a global pandemic.
But such were the times they found themselves in when, in July, brother-and-sister team David and Faye Bohan welcomed the first visitors to Wildlands in Moycullen.
Set on 20 acres of green fields, forestry and on the banks of the picturesque Ballyquirke Lake, Wildlands is proving a huge hit with locals and visitors alike. People have been booking in their droves to try out this new adventure centre, unlike any other in Ireland.
With an unrivalled 11 zip-lines of varying heights outside, as well as disc-golf, archery, forestry walks and fairy trails already up and running, Faye says they’ve been blown away by the response so far. And with much more to come both indoors and out, she feels the potential for the area is endless.
“It was our father Tim who had the vision for this place. He was friendly with James Nelson Palmer who owned the land here and who has since passed. He and Dad used to be involved in the land and Dad would say this would be a great place for doing the stuff that we were doing,” says Faye, explaining that she and David are big into outdoor activities.
The family owns Delphi Resort in Leenane and has a background in adventure tourism, but Wildlands offers something different.
“With Delphi, it’s about overnight stays and school trips, whereas we don’t get a day-tripper crowd,” explains David. “We’ve gone for that different model here where it’s a park for day-trippers.”
Plans for the Moycullen park have been in development for over four years, and it was an unsuccessful bid for a Fáilte Ireland grant that hardened the family’s resolve that they had the perfect location for this venture.
“It was after that when we became really invested in the idea,” recalls Faye. “We had done all the business plans and we really started to believe that there was a need for this in Galway, in the West and in Ireland generally.”
She and David began to research what exactly they’d put in Wildlands, taking trips to similar facilities here and abroad – looking to what was most popular in the US and UK where adventure tourism is particularly strong.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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Connacht Tribune
West has lower cancer survival rates than rest
Significant state investment is required to address ‘shocking’ inequalities that leave cancer patients in the West at greater risk of succumbing to the disease.
A meeting of Regional Health Forum West heard that survival rates for breast, lung and colorectal cancers than the national average, and with the most deprived quintile of the population, the West’s residents faced poorer outcomes from a cancer diagnosis.
For breast cancer patients, the five-year survival rate was 80% in the West versus 85% nationally; for lung cancer patients it was 16.7% in the west against a 19.5% national survival rate; and in the West’s colorectal cancer patients, there was a 62.6% survival rate where the national average was 63.1%.
These startling statistics were provided in answer to a question from Ballinasloe-based Cllr Evelyn Parsons (Ind) who said it was yet another reminder that cancer treatment infrastructure in the West was in dire need of improvement.
“The situation is pretty stark. In the Western Regional Health Forum area, we have the highest incidence of deprivation and the highest health inequalities because of that – we have the highest incidences of cancer nationally because of that,” said Cllr Parsons, who is also a general practitioner.
In details provided by CEO of Saolta Health Care Group, which operates Galway’s hospitals, it was stated that a number of factors were impacting on patient outcomes.
Get the full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune, on sale in shops now, or you can download the digital edition from www.connachttribune.ie. You can also download our Connacht Tribune App from Apple’s App Store or get the Android Version from Google Play.
Connacht Tribune
Galway minors continue to lay waste to all opponents
Galway 3-18
Cork 1-10
NEW setting; new opposition; new challenge. It made no difference to the Galway minor hurlers as they chalked up a remarkable sixth consecutive double digits championship victory at Semple Stadium on Saturday.
The final scoreline in Thurles may have been a little harsh on Cork, but there was no doubting Galway’s overall superiority in setting up only a second-ever All-Ireland showdown against Clare at the same venue on Sunday week.
Having claimed an historic Leinster title the previous weekend, Galway took a while to get going against the Rebels and also endured their first period in a match in which they were heavily outscored, but still the boys in maroon roll on.
Beating a decent Cork outfit by 14 points sums up how formidable Galway are. No team has managed to lay a glove on them so far, and though Clare might ask them questions other challengers haven’t, they are going to have to find significant improvement on their semi-final win over 14-man Kilkenny to pull off a final upset.
Galway just aren’t winning their matches; they are overpowering the teams which have stood in their way. Their level of consistency is admirable for young players starting off on the inter-county journey, while the team’s temperament appears to be bombproof, no matter what is thrown at them.
Having romped through Leinster, Galway should have been a bit rattled by being only level (0-4 each) after 20 minutes and being a little fortunate not to have been behind; or when Cork stormed out of the blocks at the start of the second half by hitting 1-4 to just a solitary point in reply, but there was never any trace of panic in their ranks.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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Connacht Tribune
Gardaí and IFA issue a joint appeal on summer road safety
GARDAÍ and the IFA have issued a joint appeal to all road users to take extra care as the silage season gets under way across the country.
Silage harvesting started in many parts of Galway last week – and over the coming month, the sight of tractors and trailers on rural roads will be getting far more frequent.
Inspector Conor Madden, who is in charge of Galway Roads Policing, told the Farming Tribune that a bit of extra care and common-sense from all road users would go a long way towards preventing serious collisions on roads this summer.
“One thing I would ask farmers and contractors to consider is to try and get more experienced drivers working for them.
“Tractors have got faster and bigger – and they are also towing heavy loads of silage – so care and experience are a great help in terms of accident prevention,” Inspector Madden told the Farming Tribune.
He said that tractor drivers should always be aware of traffic building up behind them and to pull in and let these vehicles pass, where it was safe to do so.
“By the same token, other road users should always exercise extra care; drive that bit slower; and ‘pull in’ that bit more, when meeting tractors and heavy machinery.
“We all want to see everyone enjoying a safe summer on our roads – that extra bit of care, and consideration for other roads users can make a huge difference,” said Conor Madden.
He also advised motorists and tractor drivers to be acutely aware of pedestrians and cyclists on the roads during the summer season when more people would be out walking and cycling on the roads.
The IFA has also joined in on the road safety appeal with Galway IFA Farm Family and Social Affairs Chair Teresa Roche asking all road users to exercise that extra bit of care and caution.
“We are renewing our annual appeal for motorists to be on the look out for tractors, trailers and other agricultural machinery exiting from fields and farmyards,” she said.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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