Kayaking in County Cork, Ireland: a glow in the dark adventure | Cork holidays

Halfway across the lake, Jim stops us in our kayaks and has us cup our hands to our ears. "Do you hear that?" There is a roaring sound, like a huge, powerful waterfall and it seems to be close. "That's the rapids. The tide is falling."

Cork holidays This article is more than 9 years old

Kayaking in County Cork, Ireland: a glow in the dark adventure

This article is more than 9 years oldFrom a kayak at dusk, our writer watches one of nature's wonders turn the waters of Ireland's Lough Hyne to glittering quicksilver

Halfway across the lake, Jim stops us in our kayaks and has us cup our hands to our ears. "Do you hear that?" There is a roaring sound, like a huge, powerful waterfall and it seems to be close. "That's the rapids. The tide is falling."

All around is total tranquillity, the water is a perfect sheet of dark blue silk, as is the twilit sky above. It is hard to imagine anything so boisterous as a rapid but this strange sea-lake fills up twice a day with the rising tide, then drains rapidly down a steep narrow gorge.

"Over there," says Jim, gesturing towards the nearer shore. "See the holes? There's a family of otters. Next to them there's a family of kingfishers, and on the other side of the lake there's another set of otters, also with a neighbouring family of kingfishers."

He puts his paddle in the water. "But what we're looking for is underwater. That's where the real diversity is." I peered into the depths but saw nothing.

"Not dark enough yet," says Jim, grinning. "Bioluminescence needs total darkness. Don't worry. You'll see it."

Lough Hyne, on the extreme south-west corner of Ireland, five miles from Skibbereen, is arguably the most studied slice of marine environment in the world, a process started in the 1880s by the Reverend William Spottswood Green. Between climbing the Alps and surveying British Columbia, Green happened to notice, as one might expect of a Victorian vicar, that the lake possessed an unusual species of sea urchin. Subsequent exploration revealed that this saltwater lake had over 70 species of fish, some of them, like the triggerfish, more usually associated with tropical reefs. In time it was realised that the lake had been freshwater until around 4,000 years ago when the sea broke through. Now, the tide has to work its way up to a sill, then flood in. When the tide drops the lake drains out at over three metres per second, creating the rapids.

I had a horrible feeling Jim was going to want to run those rapids but for now I was distracted by another paddler who had come along with us, Sally McKenna, a bright-eyed evangelist for the benefits of seaweed.

"Look here," she says, picking a loose bouquet of weed off the surface, "This is serrated wrack, and down there is some sea spaghetti."

Night time descends on Loch Hyne. Photograph: Jim Kennedy

I gaze down into the clear waters and see a plate of spaghetti – well, not a plate, just a portion of spaghetti, gently waving in the currents.

"I just cook a few strands with my pasta," says Sally, "It's delicious – even my kids agree. There is so much chlorophyll in seaweed that it goes bright green when you cook it."

Many years ago, before the famine that struck this area, seaweed had been a major part of agriculture and cuisine here. An old adage that reminded housewives of their duties in order of priority went: "First your potatoes, then the children and finally seaweed." Men, you will note, did not get a look in.

With depopulation, those traditional practices almost died out and are only now seeing something of a revival. Sally lists the myriad uses seaweed has. "You can put it on the garden to boost mineral levels," she says. "You can cook and eat any British seaweed. This stuff is seriously good for you. It's got 10 times more vitamin C than oranges and 50 times more iron than spinach. You can even make cosmetics and medicines."

She tells me how to soak kelp in a Kilner jar to make a handcream, something I might be in need of after a night of paddling.

Now Jim is calling us to order from across the lough. "It's not so dark on the lake so we'll head off down the rapids. There are some sea caves on the other side where we might find what we're looking for."

There is, you understand, a good reason for kayaking at night and Jim is determined that I should witness it.

"OK. Buddy up and hold on to each others' kayaks, then just head down."

Bats are flitting over our heads and an owl hoots in the trees. Sally and I hold on tight and the current is soon jetting us down, with a few bumps, and out into Balage Creek. We paddle past a couple of yachts at anchor, dim lights showing in their cabins. Jim leads us to the western side of an island. Now there is a gentle swell coming in off the ocean. Being here at night is mysterious and magical but Jim is determined to push things into the realms of weird and wonderful.

"Normally you would reverse into a sea cave," says Jim. "But this time we'll go in forwards."

There is no light and I've forgotten my headtorch. The walls close in and within a few seconds we are in total darkness. Something sparkles when I paddle. I put my hand in the water and spin it around. Suddenly an entire galaxy of stars explodes from my fingertips, sending fading constellations of pale blue lights swirling out into the black.

"Do you see it?" calls Jim. "That's whale food."

Phytoplankton is the scientific term, and the light is called bioluminescence. These tiny organisms store up light energy in the day then release it on contact by night. Eating this stuff, the baleen whales must have the brightest smiles on the planet. Each light glimmers for a few seconds, an easily perceptible glow to the human eye but something far too evanescent for any camera to adequately capture.

"Summer is the peak season," says Jim. "July and August."

I had seen this phenomenon before in the Tropics but never imagined I'd find the best display on the west coast of Ireland. There are other things to see out here on the ocean: dolphins, porpoises, basking sharks and whales often come close inshore. "We had two dolphins chasing a porpoise right here one night," says Jim.

We reverse out of the cave and into the midnight sea where the sky is now dark enough to allow the phytoplankton a chance. As we move to the quayside, sprays of light greet every dipped paddle and I cannot resist heading off into the thickest darkness where the displays are brightest. Eventually, however, Jim calls me in and, very reluctantly, I have to abandon the magical nocturnal world and do that practical and ungainly thing of getting out of a wobbly wet kayak. In retrospect, I wish I had tipped myself over and into that quicksilver water.

The trip was organised by Failte Ireland (ireland.com). Atlantic Sea Kayaking (+353 28 210 58, atlanticseakayaking.com) runs kayak expeditions along the coast around Skibbereen; the Light to Darkness trip costs €95. Rooms at West Cork Hotel (+353 28 21277, westcorkhotel.com) in Skibbereen, from €75 half board. Aer Lingus (aerlingus.com) flies to Cork from Heathrow (from £55.99) and Manchester (£45.99). Sally McKenna's book Extreme Greens: Understanding Seaweeds is published by Estragon Press (guides.ie/books) at €20

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