Holiday firm moves mountains

UNDER THE RADAR EXTREME IRELANDA LOT of people dream of quitting the nine-to-five corporate job for the great outdoors after a bad day at the office. But Keith McDonnell now lives the dream, having set up Extreme Ireland, a tourist venture that specialises in guided walking holidays in some of Ireland's most spectacular mountains and hills.

It's no surprise that the Meath native chose to set up a hiking and adventure business. Hiking in Ireland began for McDonnell when he was just a child, having been dragged all around Ireland and up and down the mountains to see his father Thomas compete in mountain races.

An electrical engineer by trade, he had been working as an IT consultant during the week, while using his mountaineering experience to do some guiding part-time.

But he reckoned there was a niche in the market for an all-in hiking holiday that brought people on a tour of Ireland and combined adventure activities with information about the history, archaeology, flora and fauna of the area, as well as a few lessons in Irish.

"The way I see it, Ireland can be the equivalent of New Zealand," he says. "It can be the New Zealand of the northern hemisphere and we didn't really have companies that could bring people to do adventure stuff in Ireland."

Ireland doesn't lack adventure activities, but unlike New Zealand, they're not easily accessible, according to McDonnell. That's what he wanted to change.

"You can pretty much do any adventure activity, but you have to make your way to them. What we wanted to do is bring people on a journey and do these things as you are going around. I think people are changing and a lot of people want to get outside. The days of just sitting on a bus are coming to an end," he says.

So just under two years ago, he quit his IT job and, using his own savings and some borrowings, set up his adventure company. For an investment of about €120,000, he launched a website, bought outdoor gear and two 16-seater buses. A €3,500 web design grant and a €15,000 employment grant from his local enterprise board also helped him get the business off the ground.

The company offers seven specialist tours such as the 15-day emerald tour and the eight-day Cork and Kerry discovery, as well as self-guided and customised tours, including mountain hikes.

"All of our guides are mountain leaders. We are all qualified to get off the trail to make it a little more exciting to walk, to try to get to the places in the mountains that people wouldn't normally get to," says McDonnell.

People can also opt to do activities such as rock-climbing, abseiling, horse-riding, parachute jumping and even bog-snorkelling.

"If we are driving through the midlands, we might stop off and take the snorkels out and do a bit of snorkelling in the Bog of Allen. It's quite fun and a novelty for people. Every few days, we might split the tour up with one of our guides teaching them how to rock-climb in the morning and then going for a hike in the afternoon. So we try to add in all of these activities as we are going along. There are a wide variety of things to do in Ireland if you use your imagination."

Extreme Ireland employs three people, all trained mountaineers, and can call on the services of another six guides.

During the off-season from October to the following April-May, the company specialises in providing rock-climbing courses, fitness assessments for people going on charity walks and some corporate business. But McDonnell reckons that hiking and adventure tours have a big future in Ireland.

"What we have in our back garden is unbelievable and that's not just Kerry or Wicklow," he says.

"We've places like the Comeragh mountains, Slieve Bloom, Connemara, Donegal, Antrim. We are blessed with the amount of land we have available for this. It is just a matter of being able to harness and use it properly and market it."