Ursula McPherson speaks about her day...
I BIKE TO WORK, 10 minutes away along Gartan Lough. I only take the car if I’m going to need it during the day.
I arrive at Gartan Outdoor Education Centre between 8.30am and 9am and have a short daily meeting with our 21-strong team. It is the only time in the day when I meet all our crew before they disperse in all directions, some to the lake, others to the woodlands and others to the hills or coast.
After that I check e-mails and prioritise responses. We run a range of adventure and environmental-education courses, for groups and individuals. We also do corporate team-building programmes, often for GAA teams looking for an edge.
I’m from Dublin, but I’ve worked at the centre for 19 years, apart from a short stint when I trained as a pilot and went to work for Aer Arann.
The first time I saw the lough I felt, This is the place. It’s steeped in the history of
St Colmcille. As well as a religious figure and the man who gave rise to copyright, he was a bit of an adventurer. A friend and I once set out in our sea kayaks from Donegal to Iona, off Scotland, for nine days, following his path and pitching our tent wherever we fetched up in the evenings.
I love travel. On other occasions I’ve cycled from Lhasa to Kathmandu and trekked up Shishapangma, a peak in Tibet. My other favourite kind of holiday is to go to the airport with my sister, who’s also a pilot, and just rent a plane, take off and see where we end up.
These days most of my time is taken up with planning and meeting and designing programmes. I work on figures and projections. Although we’re public sector we’re expected to be largely self-financing, and it’s an enormous challenge.
During the day I’ll go walkabout and have a cuppa with the cooks or a chat with the groundsman on the estate, or meet students and visitors.
At lunchtime I might cycle across the hill track to Glenveagh National Park for soup at the castle tearoom. Either at lunchtime or in the evening I will do another mountain-bike ride or run. I do most of my thinking and problem solving then.
During my down time I’m a part-time master’s student of marketing and entrepreneurship at the University of Ulster. I love business as much as I love the outdoors. But I’m like any other student – struggling to get stuck into assignments.
Ursula McPherson is managing director of Gartan Outdoor Education Centre (gartan.com), in Co Donegal
In conversation with
SANDRA O'CONNELL