Riding Stats (Link to Tom’s Strava)
Accommodations (daily mileage, elevation, etc.)
Route Tracker (track our northbound ride on a Google Map)
I’ll say one thing, weather predictions in Ireland are usually spot on. And today was no different. We got spanked! We got wet to the core; we got cold. The worse part was cycling near Glenveagh National Park and missing some stellar scenery because of the driving sheets of rain.
When riding on the bike in conditions like that, besides watching my mirror for rear approaching traffic, I have a lot of questions like:
- Why aren’t there flat sheets on the beds in Ireland?
- Where are all the pastured piggies in Ireland? We’ve cycled past hundreds of sheep and cows after eating ham, sausage, and white and black pudding included in our Irish breakfasts, however we’ve seen no pigs.🐖
- Why don’t Irish homes have landscaping (bushes and such) around them?
- Why do Irish homes have names instead of street numbers? How does mail find them?
- Why do most conditions cyclists want to avoid all have four letters?
And after we say, “At least there’s no rain today.” here comes the pop up shower with a rooster tail off your riding partner’s back tire. And of course you’d be riding on a hill.🤣
Then I started thinking, “could I make a game out of it?” like when Dan, Christie, Tom and I rode the OTET with Beer Bingo Cards?
Maybe Tic Tac Toe would work with nine squares. All I know is I ate a lot of rooster tail today.
Prayers answered though. We arrived safely. Tom found a workaround on the route that shaved off eight miles of misery and… the sun eventually came out about 3pm.
We rolled into Creeslough too early to check into lodging for the night and it was still raining hard. We knew we needed to get out of the weather as were both wet and cold and once we stop moving the chill gets worse.
Our Indy pal, John Finneran ☘️ who is an aficionado on all things Huckleberry must have been thinking about us. Look at the cafe in Creeslough at our route’s exact finish line. It was a sign to get off the bikes and get inside to get warm.
And sip on hot chocolate with lots of marshies.
The skies cleared and we hopped back on the bikes peddling to our lodging for the night. Another glamping pod!
Our Pub of the Day (and there was only one today) goes to Rose’s, a wonderfully warm, welcoming and unpretentious Irish pub with locals enjoying a pint after work on a Friday and a glowing fire.
We cycled through Loughanure today but I don’t think we even saw it with the rain.🤣
Click on the images below to view today’s video:
