Steve's Adventures 

Thu 20th Jul

Breakfast
Musili with Soya, multivitamin, primrose, garlic, water

Lunch
Chicken Salad

Dinner
Pasta with Mushrooms, Tomato and Peppers

Snacks
2 x Water, Tea, 2 x Nectarine, Grapes, 4 Oat Cake Biscuits

Dublin City Cycle

Wednesday July 19th - Dublin, Swords, Malahide, Howth, Dublin - 47 Miles

A glorious Summers evening for what could well be my last cycle outing here in Ireland.

Having been forced to come into Dublin via the Airport instead of taking the more scenic route along the coast I decided to go back and do this part again and at the same time do the Dublin City Cycle with a few people from Work.

Was a very pleasant cycle once I Was off the main roads. I was very surprised to be at the airport in 45 minutes on the bike.

Once I was in Swords I went to Malahide where the beaches were packed with holiday makers playing in the sunshine.



I then followed the coast to Howth going up and over the Howth peninsular





Then once in Dublin I went through the docks in time to see dusk over the Liffey River.



There were quite a few thousand cyclists that met up and cycled the 10km through the city streets. Plenty of upset motorists as we took over the roads for an hour. It was fun to wander through the streets and be the center of attraction :)





Tom, Tom, Pedro and Muireann all turned out to support the cyclists. Went for a drink afterwards to top off a very pleasant evenings cycle.

Dublin City Cycle 2006

Having been forced to come into Dublin via the Airport instead of taking the more scenic route along the coast I decided to go back and do this part again and at the same time do the Dublin City Cycle with a few people from Work.

Was a very pleasant cycle once I Was off the main roads. I was very surprised to be at the airport in 45 minutes on the bike. Once I was in Swords I went to Malahide and followed the coast to Howth. Up and over the Howth peninsular and then along the coast to Dublin Docks.

There were quite a few thousand cyclists that met up and cycled the 10km through the city streets. Plenty of upset motorists as we took over the roads for an hour. It was fun to wander through the streets and be the center of attraction :)

Wed 19th Jul

Breakfast
Musili with Soya, multivitamin, primrose, garlic, water

Lunch
Gnocci with tomato sause and smoked chicken, water, bread

Dinner
Tuna, New Potatoes, Salad

Snacks
4 x Water, 1 x Sports drink, Tea, 1 x Nectarine, 4 x plums, mixed fruit and nut, 1/2 Guiness

Happy Birthday Dad

My Father would have been 71 today.

Rest in Peace pops, can't tell you how much I miss you

Tue 18th Jul

Breakfast
Musili with Soya, multivitamin, primrose, garlic, water

Lunch
Granary sandwich with Turkey, Red Lettuce, Tomato and Lettuce

Dinner
Salmon, New Potatoes, Salad

Snacks
2 x Water, Tea, Oatcakes with LoCol Cheese, 5 x Nectarines, small packet of minstrels

Day 17

Saturday July 15th - Belfast to Dublin - 220 miles - Total so far 1843 miles

So excited with the prospect of being on the open road and with the weather forecast predicting glorious weather I just couldn't wait to finish work and get on my way. In the end I decided to finish work early and headed over to what would be my last train journey of the trip up to Belfast. Consequently I arrived in Belfast at 17.30 and with a good few hours of dayligh remaining I decided to take a slow amble along the coast and put a few miles behind me.

I followed my favourite road, the A2, up through Bangor which was really a pretty a little town and wound my way along the coast. Apart from the commuters heading home the roads were remarkebly quiet, I guess most people were away on vacation, and after an hour or so the cars were gone leaving the road to me.





My destination for the evening was the pretty little port of Donaghadee. I had rang ahead earlier in the day trying ot find a B&B and the only one I could find had gone out of business. The very helpful lady explained that the area, though beautiful, was basically bypassed by tourists and hence most B&B's had given up. I didn't believe this but once leaving Bangor I hardly saw any where to stay so I was pleasantly surprised to find a B&B right by the harbour. At 60 quid though I wasn't prepared to pay the price so we haggled a bit and eventually got the room for 40 quid plus an early breakfast.



After very nice meal I retired to bed early very much looking forward to a great ride in the morning. I woke at 3.45am and had my breakfast (which was excellent), packed my bags and then sat on the end of my bed waiting for first light. This came at 4.30am so I let myselfout of the front door and prepared to move off when all hell let loose. The owner of the B&B had forgotten that I was leaving early (though he had made such a fuss of making me breakfast) and had put the alarm on. As there was little I could do I cycled off into the pre-dawn light and pedalled a bit faster than I normally would as I guiltily put as much distance between the sound of the alarm and myself. I must admit that for the next hour or so I kept expecting a car to pull up behind me and an irrate B&B owner in his pyjamas ro leep out and attack for waking him up along with half the village.



The first destination was the ferry at Portaferry which lay at the mouth of Strangford Lough. First though I had to get there. The ride down the A2 was just delightful and for the first time in my trip I was able to witness the sun rise over the ocean. Having started the trip back in January I had seen no sunrises during my first few mornings because of cloud. To see the run rise, this huge golden ball ascending into the sky was just beautiful. No wonder our descendants used to throw themselves on the ground and worship this god.





I reached Portaferry by 0645 and found the town fast asleep, as well as the ferry crew, the first ferry wasn't due to leave until 0815. Of course I had known this before hand but had somehow lived in the hope that maybe they would run earlier during the summer or there would have been some other way of getting acroos such as a friendly fisherman. Dream on. So I restocked sports drinks from the bakery along with some soda bread and an iced bun to build up the carbs.



Once across the ferry I found the A2 again and followed the coast south. The main thing I was aware at this stage of the day was that Dublin was my destination for the weekend but now that the ferry was behind me and I had over 13 hours of daylight left I could actually reach Dublin by nighfall if I really tried. It was very tempting and the prospect of stopping off in some B&B north of Dublin because of a lack of effort on my part was a red rag to a bull. I had to give it my best shot.

Now to reach Dublin I had to set myself a number of targets so first one was Newcastle that I reckoned if I could reach by 1100 would be a good start. In fact once I saw The Mourne Wall in the distance I knew I was getting close and soon I was there at 1045. A lovely lively town full of tourists and very busy but no time to stop so it was in one end and out the other.





The road from Newcastle to Newry was very pleasant as it floowed the coast for the most part eventually turning inland, past Warrenpoint and to Newry. In fact earlier I had taken a little detour to another name that had leapt from the page and reminded me of my times in Ireland as a soldier. The camp at Ballykinler is the main training camp for the British Army and boy had it changed since I was there. I remember old nissen huts, wind swept barracks and delapidated huts. Today it looked very fortified and boasted many new buildings and lots of refurbishment. As I climbed into the hills around the camp I tried to locate the "tin city" where I had done my training but with so many new buildings it wasn't possible to really make anything out. Still it was yet another blast from the past and interesting to see.

The road to Newry was fast and I rode with another cyclist for most of the way from Warrenpoint. As we barrelled along at 17mph chatting away I found myself talking about how I had cycled around Ireland and that this was my 17th day of cycling. The fact that this was spread out over the last 7 months somehow got left out :( What a fraud !! Also the pace was killing me but I kept the banter up and a fixed grin on my face, it was only after he turned off that I drastically reduced my speed and let out a long groan before pulling up and taking a quick break.

From Newry it got a lot harder. First of all the terrain was known to me so I knew what was ahead. The ride from Newry to Dublin is pretty dull with long stretches of "coast" road following the coast about 3 miles inland. Also the wind picked up and the as long as I was heading east progress was slow. However I reached Newry at 1300 an hour earlier than I thought and I was in Carlingford for 1400 so things were looking good.



Around to Dundalk and some very boring cycling to Drogheda where I suffered my first puncture on my trip todate. I had learnt alot from my earlier days of having punctures so quickly swapped inner tubes and checked the tyre for what caused the puncture. I was soon back on the bike and reached Drogehda at 1800 which still left me 4 hours to get home. With Dublin buses on the road now and the DART going through the same towns I was going there was no way I was going to give up.



By now I was tired and running out of daylight. With 50 miles to cover in 4 hours I knew it was going to be tough. I really wanted to get to Dublin via Malahide and Howth because that at least followed the coast and was interesting, However once I got to Swords it just wasnt an option as I had no time so I picked up the airport road and thundered home. When I think of all the times I have taken a taxi to the airport and just how easy it was to get there I could have kicked myself. It's so close to town that I should have cycled, would have saved myself a fortune in taxi fairs thats for sure.

At 2220 I rolled into the garage beneath the apartment just as the last of the light disappeared. An epic end to an epic journey and one that I will always treasure.

I will always look back at Ireland with incredible fondness for this has been a truly amazing journey physically, mentally and spiritually. The physical aspect I was well geared up to face and never really felt I couldn’t do it. The mental effort of being alone on my bike for sometimes 16 hours was something that again I felt was not going to be too much of a problem. What has surprised me is how much the beauty of Ireland has touched. From the remoteness of the South West with its ghostly ruins of cottages reminding me of the famine and economic ruin, to the rolling Glens of Antrim there has been so much to drink in. I have been a lucky person to have experienced this and I leave with a very different slant on life, I have after all had a lot of time to think.

“If we are ever to enjoy life, now is the time, not tomorrow or next year…Today should always be our most wonderful day.”
Thomas Drier, Author

Mon 17th Jul

Breakfast
Musili with Soya, multivitamin, primrose, garlic, water, Toast x 2

Lunch
Granary sandwich with Turkey, Tomato and Lettuce

Dinner
Japanes noodles wih prawns

Snacks
4 x Water, Tea, Oatcakes with LoCol Cheese, 1 x Apple

Sun 16th Jul

Breakfast
Musili with Soya, multivitamin, primrose, garlic, water

Lunch
Salmon, Potato, Beans, Spinach, Peas, Carrots, Parsnip

Dinner
Salad with olives

Snacks
6 x Water, Oakcakes with LoCol cheese, 3 x Peaches, Grapes

Belfast to Dublin

1843 Miles / 2965 Km (Paris-Moscow 1550 miles, Dublin-Izmir 1850 miles, London-Paris 213 miles)
17 Days
Average Speed 12 mph
Fastest speed attained 43mph Connor Pass
Shortest mileage in a day was 54, Longest 220
12 Trains
8 Buses
1 Taxi
5 Ferries
1 Puncture, 2 Tyres, 4 sets of brakes blocks, 1 derailer gear set
1 Twisted knee, 1 very sore butt, 2 sore nipples and a numb little finger on my left hand
1 Bonk

Well the odysey has come to and end as I finally finished the last leg of what has been an epic journey around the coast of Ireland. The last leg from Belfast to Dublin was done in glorious weather and in 1 day making this by far the furthest I have ever cycled at one time. 200 miles of cycling, a dozen sports drinks, and 16 hours in the saddle later I arrived home.

It has been a truly wonderful adventure and when I leave Ireland next week I will carry away with me some wonderful memories of both the country, the culture and the people