Month: September 2026

Riding Stats (Link to Tom’s Strava)

Accommodations (daily mileage, elevation, etc.)

Route Tracker (track our northbound ride on a Google Map)

This is only day one of our northbound ride along the Atlantic Coast but it seems like it’s been two weeks.😂 Here’s the skinny:

☘️Most importantly, there is NO way our iPhones will capture the beauty of this country. It’s simply not possible. Given that, we’ll do our best to give you an idea of this spectacular scenery.

☘️Drones gonna do what they gonna do along the windy Atlantic coast in Ireland.💨

☘️There is a stout brewed in Ireland that we like a wee bit better than Guinness. Murphy’s!

☘️The roads are narrow but the drivers are patient and courteous.

☘️Ya can’t go to the clubhouse at Old Head Golf Links for a stout or cuppa tea without a tee time and clubs. That’s just not the way it’s done. We did get Tom’s pic by the gate tho!

The smallish villages and scattered townlands we cycled through kept us from counting the miles or elevation. We passed by Old Head and through Garrettstown, Timoleague, Courtmacsherry and we landed in Clonakilty.

Two more bits of history:

🚢The passenger ship H R M The Lusitania was sunk by a German submarine on May 7, 1915 with 1,959 people aboard and sunk in just 18 minutes. This happened a short distance off the southern tip of Old Head.

There is a memorial located at a scenic viewpoint we visited along the way. There’s some controversy about the contents of the ship of course. Some claim the Lusitania was carrying munitions to support the efforts of the British in WWI, hence the torpedo.

✝️ Near Timoleague we walked through the ruins of the Timoleague Friary. Prior to the Franciscans, the Augustinians were thought to have congregated there. The stone walls still remain firm and protect many gravestones within the friary although the structure’s roof is no more. It’s worth learning more about here.

By the way, Eurovelo 1 begins in Norway, ends in Portugal and is about 6,000 miles long. We’re cycling just a small portion of it in Ireland.

More pics from today’s ride in the video below.

Riding Stats (Link to Deb’s Strava)

Accommodations (daily mileage, elevation, etc.)

Route Tracker (track our northbound ride on a Google Map)

Time for some shenanigans and a shakedown ride!☘️

Tom boxed up the bikes nice and tidy for their direct overnight flight from Indy to Dublin with us in tow. We take them as checked baggage along with one additional duffle bag that includes our clothing and bike gear.

Since the Tipperary House wasn’t ready for us to check in (I mean it was only 10am), we strolled over to the park across the street to put the bikes together.

I actually went to get some coffee and donuts for us while Tom assembled the bikes. The Tipperary House will store the empty bike boxes and duffle until we get back in early October.

With bike chores out of the way we set our sites to visit the historic Temple Bar and the following day, a tour of the Guinness Storehouse. Tom loves the beer 🍻 here and I love the flowers. They are lovely!

A visit to the Storehouse isn’t complete without a “Stoutie” so yes we opted in for a couple of pints with our selfies on top of the Guinness foam. #typicaltourists

After two nights in Dublin we left our bike boxes behind and rode to the train station for our 2.5 hour ride to Cork where we began our shakedown ride to Kinsale as it’s the starting point for our portion of Eurovelo 1.

The bikes performed well and our legs even better on the hills between Cork and Kinsale, but dang were our lungs heaving and heart pumping.

Arriving in Kinsale with plenty of time to spare, we took in a four-mile round trip walk to Charles Fort, a fascinating 17th-century star-shaped military fortress built between 1688 and 1692 and named for King Charles II.

With discounts for “seniors,” we couldn’t resist a self-guided tour of this impressive structure, with its massive ramparts, bastions and parapets overlooking Kinsale Harbor.

Finally, I can’t say enough about the harbor town of Kinsale with its narrow roads, colorful buildings, pubs and shops. More pics in the video below.