All language subtitles for The Chronicles of Erne - 1x03_track3_eng

Lough Erne in County Fermanagh,

the westernmost county
of Northern Ireland.

According to myth,

the Erne was named after
the goddess Erann,

whose divine power was
dissolved into the water,

breathing life into
the surrounding landscape.

The Erne has been a centre for human
activity for thousands of years,

but with more than 150 islands and
500 square kilometres of water,

there's still plenty
of hidden corners,

providing sanctuary for some of
Europe's most endangered species.

Filmed over a year,

this is the story of
this ancient water world,

told by today's tribe
of river people,

as they work hard across the seasons

to preserve and maintain
the Erne's precious habitats

for future generations to enjoy.

It's autumn, and as the summer
visitors drift away,

the shores and islands of the lough
are beginning to change.

The sinking sun and shrinking days

give the lough
a different atmosphere.

Every bit as beautiful
as any season.

A long winter is coming.

But autumn is the Erne's opportunity
for a final hurrah.

It's September, and underneath
the Erne's misty waters,

pike are on the move.

In just over a month,

Enniskillen will be hosting
the Erne Pike Classic.

Brothers Frankie and Eddie Roofe

are spending today scouting for
prize-winning fishing spots.

Their obsession with this mysterious
and elusive prey began in childhood.

The story goes that my father
went and bought an old boat

round the town and Eddie and I
went out fishing with him.

We were probably
about eight or nine.

We were going past Sandy Bottom
and...the big pike hit.

He started winding it in,

and he wound it in closer
and closer all the time.

He handed it to me.
He says, "Hold that."

As I held it in my hand
like that there,

I looked over the side of the boat,

and this big pike was about 27
or 28 pound, maybe even,

with a mouth on it like
that there, full of teeth,

and of course I threw
the hand line up in the air

and off it went across the water.

And we'll not tell you the end
of the story, but I got a skite.

Come on, fish.

Here's it coming in now
on the top of the water.

Look it, just behind.

Wait till you see. Look it.
Look. Here, see it?

You have to respect any creature

that puts up the kind of
fight that a pike does,

cos he does not want
to come into your boat.

And they're a hangover from
the era of the dinosaur.

They can be big and dangerous
and they've a lot of teeth,

and some people are afraid of them.

I'm famous for...having
to go to the hospital

and get hooks taken out of my hand.

Nice fish.

Very small but nice.

As the days get shorter and colder,

the trees in the ancient woodlands
that surround the lower lough

begin to turn.

It's an annual spectacle,

much enjoyed by nature writer
Dara McAnulty.

Autumn is the season where the
entire forest is full of colour

and everything just seems
to be exploding with life.

It hasn't really gone into
the dreariness of winter just yet,

and it still doesn't have
that just intensity

that you just can never
escape from in summer,

and autumn is just that perfect
balance of it all.

And it also has the mushrooms,
which are absolutely incredible.

Mushroom. Woo!

Do not know how I spotted this one.

OK, now I've lost it.

Oh, found it.

There are a number of different
types of mushrooms.

We have the saprophytic mushrooms,

which grow on dead organic matter
and feed off it, break it down.

They break down the leaves

and bring those nutrients
back into the system.

You've also got then
the parasitic ones,

which grow on living organic matter,

and they steal away some of the life
energy and nutrients from its host,

which is usually a tree or
a different type of plant.

And now the final and, I would
think, the most interesting of them.

They are called mycorrhizal.
There we go.

They're really, really, really,
really microscopic,

and they wrap around
each other so much

that you can get hundreds
of kilometres of them

in just a small handful of soil.

So that's enough to stretch
across the country.

Imagine it as a massive
underground system of tubes.

It takes in the nutrients
from the soil

and from the dead leaves
which fell from the tree,

and then it's giving it
back into the tree

through this network of mycelium.

You can't really see them,

but they are the binding force that
keeps the entire forest together.

There are a couple of scientists
working on theories

that it is possible...
HE CHUCKLES

..that the trees can be
somehow communicating

through this mushroom web.

It's starting to become known
as the wood wide web.

I think it's truly magical.

Back in Enniskillen, it's the start
of the rowing season.

Situated between the upper
and lower loughs,

this island town is home to
Enniskillen Royal Boat Club.

Pressure on. Legs. Legs.
Drive it through.

Last year's senior teams
are now off to university,

but this year's new hopefuls
are training hard.

Keep your inside shoulders back.
Outside shoulder up.

Around 14,000 people
live in Enniskillen,

making it the Erne's largest town.

Morning.

Baker Joe Kelly was born here.

Just be a couple of
minutes here. Sure.

Got a lot of stuff.

He was brought up in America
but returned 15 years ago

and has been running the bakery
for the last two years.

OK.

When I first started, I was
doing about 30 loaves a day.

Now I'm up to about 70.

My bread is an old way
of making bread,

and basically, it's only
three ingredients,

so it's only flour, water and salt,

and those three things create
this wonderful loaf

of leavened bread that looks great,
tastes great and is good for you.

OK, I'm going to need about a ten-
minute break after this, all right?

What I call myself is a community
baker, so I bake for my community.

Just leave the delicate
stuff till last,

just in case I do fall, you know?

I'm not a large scale.

As long as I can maintain a certain
number of loaves every day,

then I can sustain
a living out of it.

So I mix the bread, make the bread,
bake the bread,

deliver the bread, sell the bread,
sweep up the floors at the end.

So I'm scoring the bread

because there's air bubbles
trapped inside the loaf.

Allows the bread to expand.

I just do a simple scoring method.

In the old days when they had
community bakers,

families would make
their own bread at home,

and then they would bring it
down to the baker

and he would fire the bread.

They would do a certain kind of cut
so that when the bread was baked,

the family would know
which bread was theirs.

The Erne sits in a wide basin

on rocks formed
330 million years ago

when Ireland was near the equator.

Above the upper lough
in Cuilcagh Mountain,

rivers that eventually feed the Erne
plunge through limestone rock

to carve out the 12-kilometre
Marble Arch cave system,

which attracts more than
70,000 visitors a year.

Near Moses Cradle,

painter Lorna Smith is working
on sketches for oil paintings

that will form the centrepiece of
an exhibition later this year.

The greatest teacher in painting
is actually the landscape itself.

The colours, the textures,
the sculptural effect.

I'm looking at perfection,

and it's natural.

Not all the caves in the Marble Arch
system are so accessible.

Upstream where the Owenbrean River
pushes through the rock

is Pollasumera.

Yeah, very slippy at
this time of year.

It's a favourite spot for husband
and wife Tim and Pam Fogg.

Based in Fermanagh, they have
explored caves all over the world.

We just don't know what's
underneath our feet.

There's no way of telling.

Who knows what might be there?
And that is the big attraction.

There's certainly rivers in
Fermanagh sinking underground.

We know there must be
a cave passage in there,

but we haven't found a way into it.

Maybe we never will.

That boulder in front of you
wasn't there before.

That's been blown in by
a huge flood. Wow. My God.

Must weigh a tonne or more.
Yeah, just shows you.

Water is a huge part of Fermanagh.

The water aggressively
wears the rock,

but also chemically, it wears
the rock and makes the caves

the size and shape they are.

You can see in this cave
the amount of flood debris,

even a full-grown tree.

Huge boulders, maybe
a tonne of weight,

have been washed in by
the force of the water.

It's incredible.

Well, it just shows you what it's
like when it rains heavily.

Not a place for us to be.

Quite low here.

Ooh. When you come into a cave,

you're sort of getting
into the heart of things.

You're getting inside geology

and you're also getting
inside the hydrology,

the way the water flows
and joins together and links

to eventually all join
together into the Erne.

Nice little waterfall here!

It's almost like the underworld.

This is what's been going on
beneath the surface.

There's a raindrop that's coming
through,

and it's just plopping
just onto the water,

and I thought it was
very interesting,

the reflections of the stalactites,
because that's how they're formed.

There's a very interesting thing
the Dalai Lama said.

"The smallest of thing
is always significant."

Every single drop matters.

This is a fantastic thing.
This is a sandstone boulder,

and it's held in place with calcite,
which is the same as the stalactite.

And there's another one here,
exactly the same thing,

except these are really
big boulders,

and they've been cemented in place
by the calcite floor.

So this level of infill must
have been right across

this part of the cave,
and it's all been washed out.

It's incredible how
this is just suspended.

Oh, there's a lot of infill here.

The wonderful thing
about in here is,

once we get away from daylight,
it is completely dark.

There's no natural light.

It doesn't matter how long
you keep your eyes open.

Your eyes won't get used to
the dark. It is velvety black.

Your hearing becomes
much more acute.

And then you start to hear voices,

and you think there's people in
the cave or there's people coming,

and you say, "Hello."

There's nobody there.

So we're right away
from the water now,

and it's got really, really quiet.

Let's turn the lights out,
see what...

That's nice, isn't it?

Inky blackness.

It's October and, above ground,

the temperature is
beginning to drop.

At Crom Castle on the shores
of the upper lough,

the male deer will soon be rutting.

It's a reminder that
winter is on its way.

In Enniskillen, it's the weekend
of the Erne Pike Classic,

where fishermen from across Europe
battle for a prize fund

of over £12,000.

Competing for local pride
as well as the money

are Frankie and Eddie Roofe.

We're a bit nervous, but we, you
know, we have a lot of work to do

to get ready, make sure
we're ready to go.

Hopefully it'll go well for us.

Two years ago, I had a fish
22 lbs 4 oz.

And it got me second place
in the competition.

With your prize, you get a cap.

It's just something I like
to wear on the competitions.

Try and intimidate
everybody else, you know?

All the best today.

Have a good day. He's supposed to
blow the whistle,

but can't even see him.

He must be down there.
There's still boys weighing in,

getting their boats
checked down there.

But it is half ten. He should be
ready to blow the whistle now.

WHISTLE BLOWS
Right, boys, have a good day!

I'm just going to try
something different.

I'm going to put a bit of coconut
oil on to give it a wee bit of taste

and a bit of a smell.

And if that doesn't work,
I'm going to try a bit of garlic.

At Castle Caldwell,

Dara is enjoying the last throes
of the forest's annual colour show.

Man-made creations like houses,
shopping centres -

humans haven't really had those for
a very, very long amount of time,

and in all honesty, we're
still getting used to them.

And I'm autistic, so I feel
everything that little bit more,

and it's that intensity that us
humans just really aren't used to.

A sensory overload feels
as though the entire world

is collapsing in on you as though
you could... It's like...

You can just feel things coming
in from you on all sides,

and you start curling up
in a little ball,

and it just feels utterly awful,

like the entire world is
just collapsing in on you.

And there's nothing you can
do to stop it.

I don't really think that
that's a coincidence

that I feel so much more
relaxed amongst the trees

than amongst people.

I think that everybody has this need
to be outside to a certain extent.

Maybe they don't collapse
in a shopping centre,

but everybody does get stressed.

We cannot function to the best
of our ability

without spending some time in nature
to let ourselves recuperate.

Back in Enniskillen,

organisers of the Erne Pike Classic
have been having a busy weekend.

Nice and easy.

Beautiful.

That's the heaviest pike here
the day for me.

It was 7 lbs 8 oz.

I heard there's one at 18, just over
18 lbs, you know, been caught.

For Frankie and Eddie Roofe,

it has been a frustrating
couple of days.

Nothing yet anyway.

There has to be a big fish
here somewhere.

Yes! There's now only
a few hours left,

and they need to catch a pike of at
least 14 lbs to qualify for a prize.

Give me the rod.
You're nearly off the boat.

Just have to break it, Eddie.
We're not going to get it out.

Don't break the rod, though.

One of those things. A big rock,
or... That's right. No doubt.

Or three.

There's a boy after
catching fish. Look it.

Good lads. Well done.

This man's catching a fish
over here beside us now.

A small one. Aye, looks
to be small, yeah.

Regardless of what happens
next year,

we're going to sit on the bank,
on the edge of the bank,

and we're going to fish
out of the boat.

You think so? I do, yeah,

because this has been real
hard work for no return.

To me, sitting in the
same spot the whole day

wouldn't really be
my cup of tea, Eddie.

If it comes down to it, we'll be
going out in two separate boats,

and I will sit on
the shore the whole day.

I guess the two of us
is too set in our ways.

No, no... Oh, you're willing
to change, are you?

I'm up for change.

That's a fish. Eh?

Good fish. Good fish. Get the net.

Right. Bring it here to me.

That's it, jump into the boat, mate.

That's good.

We mightn't sit in the hedge
next year after all.

Nice and gentle.

25 minutes to go.

We'll weigh it just to make sure.
It may not be heavy enough,

because there's been a lot of big
fish caught today as well,

so we'll just wait and get it
weighed and see what it is.

Take that, would you? Yeah.

Near enough... Not too much
above 12, it is. Is it?

Turn her round till we see.

13 pound? 13 it is. Yeah.

13.

That's disappointing,
but there you are.

OK, lads. Thanks very much.

Disappointed in that there.

Definitely looked bigger.

Down at riverside,

retired schoolteacher Pat Lunny

is picking up his boat
for an evening on the lough.

He has lived in Enniskillen
all his life.

The house with the green
round the windows there

is the house that I was born in.

And who wouldn't want to be born
somewhere like this, right?

Spent my whole life here.
I will end my life here.

Excuse me speaking
about things like that.

Going to take my brother
Dermot up now.

We're going to go down
the lower lake,

down along the pump house shore.

Dermot's a Parkinson's sufferer.

When I say sufferer,
he's a very good sufferer.

Get the old legs kind of going as
best you can. We'll head on down.

He was a PE teacher
in his younger life,

so his mobility being restricted
has to be a bit of a pain.

Watch out.

Come on ahead. Come on down.

That's you. Now, we'll have
to go gently here now,

because there's a lot of activity
on the lake today, Dermot.

They're rowing very well,
doesn't it?

It's just fantastic. Look to
the corner, you see? Yeah.

It must be there's a rowing school
for boys in Ireland,

North and South.

Downstream, baker Joe Kelly
is taking his kids

over to Inish Doney island
for a night of foraging.

OK, we're off.

It's owned by his parents,
who now live there full-time.

Coming out here,

it's like you're leaving
the rest of the world behind you.

It's always been like that,
even when I was younger

and we'd come home for the summer.

The island brings
a whole new meaning

to kind of getting away
from it, though,

cos it's...like a little slice of
paradise all to yourself, you know?

Now, keep your eyes open
for the crab apples, Owen.

Yeah, here we are.

To be honest, they don't
taste that great.

They have a real sharp kind
of pungent taste to them,

but what they're full of is pectin.

So they're really great
for making jam with,

and what you do with them
is you boil them up

with a little bit of sugar,
and then you add some flavourings,

like maybe some star anise
and some clove,

and then it turns all mushy,

and then you basically strain it
and it becomes crab apple jelly.

I used to have crab apple jelly
when I was a child,

and it's really good on pancakes.

That's probably enough there.
Let me see.

That'll get us about
a couple of jars.

So we are on the lookout for
the chanterelle mushrooms, right?

Those we definitely know
we can cook those up.

That's a possible chanterelle.
Go ahead and grab it out of there.

If you go to a restaurant,
you get, like, wild mushrooms

and, you know, mushrooms
that are in season.

Usually a lot of time,
they're chanterelles

or a type of chanterelle.

We'll keep going here and
see if we can find a...

Are you just going to wipe it on me?
That's OK, yeah. Go ahead.

What's that there?

That there is a star... That is a
star rain cap, I think it's called.

What's interesting about these
is whenever you squeeze them,

they do like this here.

They have a gland inside them
that carries their spores,

so that's how they reproduce.

Keep an eye out for
the blackberries, too,

just there might be
a few left still.

Oh, those are great.
Look. Eat that one.

Ah, it's really good. Mm.

This is one of my favourite
places to come on the island.

Never get tired of
looking at it at all.

I spend most of my time trying
to figure out a way

to be able to stay out here more.

You want to head on here before
we lose the light, guys? Yeah. Yeah.

Across the lough, Pat Lunny
and his brother Dermot

are also settling down
to enjoy the fading sun.

If you look around here,

all you can see is a ribbon of land.

Because it's a calm evening,

the sky and the lake
are basically one.

As the light drops, it will
pick up that wee bit more.

No two people with Parkinson's
exhibit the same symptoms.

It's really a challenge
to the medics.

About seven or eight years ago,

I suddenly discovered that I was
dragging my left leg slightly

when I was walking.

And the guy that I worked with said,

"You should go and get that checked
out," which I did in the hospital.

I had an idea before I went
what was wrong,

cos I had an uncle
who had Parkinson's

and he displayed much
the same symptoms, you know?

But it's not the end
of the world, Parkinson's.

I can tell you,
I take it as it comes.

The lake has a calming effect on me.

I like Lough Erne, you know.

In this day and age where mental
illness is such a problem

and treatment of it
is such a problem,

it's great to have
something to distract you

and make you appreciate
the environment, you know.

It's heaven on Earth where
I'm concerned, you know.

You're closer to God when
you're on the lake.

I remember I had a few religious
ladies out one time.

I was telling them that
I was quare glad

the Pope didn't come down
Lough Erne when he came to Ireland.

"Why is that?"

I says, "Sure, it's so pleasurable,
he'd have made it a sin."

Growing old sucks.

By being old and being
here tonight,

it doesn't suck tonight,
does it? No.

Autumn on the Erne
is coming to a close.

The caves are just so beautiful and
you just want to do justice to them.

OK, girls? Right, ready?
Go! Push off!

Soon the lough will fall
under its winter spell...

..a time for Erne's river people
to step back and take stock

while they wait for spring.

Clean socks make fabulous mitts.

I'm barely able to speak
here it's so cold.