Dave Byrnes

Round Ireland - 2016

Overview Planned Schedule Map Diary Pictures

Day:	006
Date:	Wednesday, 30 March 2016
Start:	Bunclody
Finish:	Borris
Daily Kilometres:	27
Total Kilometres:	177
Weather:	Cold, breezy and sunny most of the day
Accommodation:	Brenda's B&B
Nutrition:	Breakfast: Full Irish Breakfast Lunch: Muesli bars and Snickers bars Dinner: Fish and chips, and chocolate
Aches:	Feet quite sore near long road descent from Mt Leinster
Highlight:	Enjoying my first snack break sitting in the sun, in my "dress circle seat" high on the side of Greenoge, admiring the beautiful Irish countryside vista spread out before me as far as the eye could see.......which was a very long way.
Lowlight:	The first 4km of the day along the side of a very busy trunk road, but it wasn't that bad.
Pictures:	Here
GPS Track:	Here
Journal:	After my long day yesterday, and knowing I had up to 30km to cover today, I stayed up later than usual going through all of my gear, selecting and packing the items I planned to mail back to London in the morning from the local post office. The selected gear included some camping plates/cup and cutlery, winter gloves, and most of my first aid kit (which was originally put together to cope with wilderness injuries in remote Australia). The packing was interrupted by a blow to the head on the corner of an overhanging shelf which hurt and drew blood......maybe I should be keeping the first aid gear! Anyway, the net result was a pack that was a bit lighter and easier to pack and I went to bed happy. After another excellent Irish breakfast and much chatting with the well-travelled hostess, Liz, I left about 9:30am, stopped by the post office in the busy little provincial town to mail my parcel, and was out of the city limits by 10:00am. To get to Kildavin, the start of the South Leinster Way, my next trail, I had to walk 4km along a busy trunk road. Fortunately, there was a narrow breakdown lane which allowed for safe walking and the morning sunshine compensated somewhat for the traffic noise and turbulence from passing trucks. On the outskirts of the village of Kildavin I spotted the turn-off for the South Leinster Way and soon left the traffic and noise behind me. I didn't really have much idea of the route for today's walk, but figured it would likely be less interesting than the better-known Wicklow Way. I was wrong. Although continually climbing, at first along a narrow country lane and then along a forest road, the grade was easy, the sun and cool air invigorating, and the views increasingly spectacular. At my first snack break, with a great rural vista spread before me, reaching to far distant mountains, I was asking myself "How good is this?". The climb continued then the trail followed a ridge with views on the other side of the mountain, before joining a single-lane alpine-like road that climbed through moorland over the shoulder of the dominating Mt Leinster, with ever-present awesome views to the north and west. It was possible to pick out some of the forecast rain showers here and there in the distance, but they never reached me. From Mt Leinster, there was a long road descent through more rural countryside on lanes to my destination of Borris. I had called ahead before leaving in the morning to book a room at a B&B which was a kilometre or two south of town, and had told the host, Connor, that I would be there between 5:00pm and 6:00pm. He immediately offered to drive into town and pick me up if I called when I arrived. In the event, I got into town about 4:20pm, so spent some time researching likely accommodation for the next night and booked a room by phone. Then I went and bought myself an early dinner of fish and chips which I ate watching the Borris world go by before buying some snacks and drinks at the local mini-market and calling Connor, who picked me up soon after. He and his wife, Brenda, were the perfect hosts, extending the good experiences I have had with the Irish so far. During the day, two separate drivers, one male and one female, stopped and offered me a lift (which I gracefully declined) while I was hiking along the road. I was in my room by 6:00pm and looking forward to catching up on some email and other chores before having an early night. It had been a good day, capped off by the sight of a healthy-looking red fox casually loping across the paddock outside my bedroom window in the late afternoon sunshine as I type this journal.