Dave Byrnes

Round Ireland - 2016

Overview Planned Schedule Map Diary Pictures

Day:	030
Date:	Saturday, 23 April 2016
Start:	Castlemaine
Finish:	Anascaul
Daily Kilometres:	26
Total Kilometres:	855
Weather:	Cool and overcast at first, then mostly sunny
Accommodation:	Ardrinane House B&B
Nutrition:	Breakfast: Cereal, scrambled eggs and smoked salmon, toast and jam Lunch: Muesli bars and chocolate Dinner: Sausages, vegetables and chips, ice-cream and apple tarts
Aches:	None really
Highlight:	The vast expanse of Inch Strand, a famous beach at the entrance to Castlemaine Harbour, location for some scenes in the movie Ryan's Daughter.
Lowlight:	The roadwalk from Castlemaine to Inch along a busy two-lane road with virtually no roadside margin. I probably had to step off the road into a hedge about every five minutes on average, so that cars travelling in both directions could get past me. On the plus side, the motorists were invariably considerate and it went quicker than I expected.
Pictures:	Here
GPS Track:	Here
Journal:	I left Castlemaine at 9:00am, a bit apprehensive about the 20km roadwalk along a busy road to the village of Inch where I would connect with the Dingle Way. Generally, I try to find back roads, but there were none for this leg, so I resigned myself to staying alert and dodging cars for four hours. I wasn't alone, meeting a runner coming the other way early on (glad, as a runner, that I don't live nearby), and a lot of Saturday morning recreational cyclists out for a spin on a beautiful day. It was tedious at times, constantly having to step into the hedgerows to give cars room to pass, but it passed quickly enough and I joined the Dingle Way at Inch before 1:00pm. The trail climbed behind the village, giving a great view of Inch Strand, a vast flat stretch of sand backed by dunes at the entrance to Castlemaine Harbour. It has featured in a few films, most notably Ryan's Daughter. Behind it, across the bay, were the mountains of the Iveragh Peninsula and the Kerry Way where I had been walking a few days earlier. By the topology, I could work out exactly where I had been hiking. It seemed a long way away. From Inch, the Dingle Way climbed over the shoulder of Brickany Mountain along a narrow old farm road before descending on a sealed road into the village of Anascaul, my destination for the day. I followed some weekend walkers into the village and quickly found my B&B, arriving at 3:00pm. After a shower, I had a wander around the village before returning to the B&B to watch some rugby in the lounge while catching up on email and some other chores. I went to the pub across the road for dinner, just sneaking in before the cook went home at 6:00pm, the second time I've almost been caught out in the last week, and after a walk around town and an ice-cream returned to the B&B.