Ride outs
Beara Peninsula
On Sunday 30th of August we went for a ride out with the bikes, as they had forecasted no rain and there was no road race on the calendar. The idea was to go to Beara Peninsula, the one just before the famous and very touristic “Ring of Kerry”.
The peninsula ends with an island, “Dursey Island”: we had been there with the car on the first August week-end (and the truth is that those roads are much more enjoyable with the bikes!).
From Dursey Island
Dursey Island
View over Kerry Peninsula “Ring of Kerry”
The first part of the road is a large and good national road, and then it’s a secondary road but also quite good.
On the first part, still not very far from Cork, there is a very good section, recently paved, with beautiful views over “Iniscarra Reservoir”. That morning the lake was completely still, with amazing reflections. We stopped to take pictures of course!
Close to Kenmare we found a very nice place to eat our sandwiches. There also the water was still and with beautiful reflections.
After the sandwiches we went on entering to the peninsula from the North, going along the coast and with views to Kerry peninsula (where are the highest Irish mountains, over 1000 metres high, right next to the ocean).
We took the first road on the left, the R574 that goes through “Healy Pass”. This road is amazing, with almost no traffic, beautiful views to “Glanmore Lake”, over the Ring of Kerry, and of the mountains around us.
We stopped several times to take pictures and enjoy the silence, the views and the PEACE it radiates. At the first stop we were parked close to the entrance of a garden with a man mowing his lawn. He looked happy that we were taking pictures of the views from his house 🙂 .
After getting to the south part of the road and as we were tired, we decided to go back home instead of following to Dursey Island.
I think that when the good season is back we will have to plan a full week-end with a stay overnight in B&B, because there is so much to see and the roads are very nice.
So we went back through Glengarrif and then we took the R584 which goes to Gougane Barra (see post about “Colourful ride out”), with many corners, and some bumpy sections.
Anyway in general I think that most secondary roads in Ireland are not for speeding… but more like to enjoy the scenery…
We got back home a little tired but happy.
Beara Peninsula, we will have to come back…
V’s
Trips
Our Honeymoon Trip- Third Week
If you have missed the first week it’s here:
And the second is here:
On Monday, we were on the road again, for our 3rd week holiday, 547km and 6 hours according to Google…
Here is the global map of the trip (excepting the small rides in each area):
No problem on the road, some heavy (but short) showers, and some stress because we had not refuelled before leaving Armoy, and we did more than 100km without seeing a petrol station (on the motorway), until Juan got the great idea to turn on the Tom Tom and see that we had to go out of the motorway to find a petrol station… 230km since the last refuel, and 20km already on reserve for him…
We finally arrived to our destination, Killarney, at the end of the afternoon, quite tired by the travel and the rain. This time in B&B.
First day there we went for the “Ring of Kerry”, very nice landscapes, nice views there too…
but some parts of the road are quite in a bad state… and on the way back we got stuck behind a slow car and then a truck with no possibility to overtake. We were wrecked…
Last day was very rainy, so we went to Killarney center to get some “souvenirs”. And the best memory of Killarney is a nice chat with a nice local man in a pub there at night.
Holidays were coming to their end…
We left on Thursday to Rosslare, 260km, 3h30 according to Google. A little more, with rain all morning. It stopped raining just before Waterford, and we finally arrived quite dry to our last B&B.
Nice people there, very welcoming (and bikers). We went to a pub nearby for dinner, very good food and very good service. And our last pints of Guinness/Bulmers.
It was so nice that we went back the day after for lunch before taking the ferry.
The trip back was quite unpleasant for me (and so for Juan!) as the sea was not too calm, and I got sick…
When we arrived to Cherbourg, we had to get used to drive on the other side again, and got back to reality… An Irish car just out of the ferry overtook us (it was limited at 90km/h but it was 2 lanes, and I did not see any signal) and got chased by French police who made him go out to the next exit to fine him… Welcome back to France and nice French habits! :/ Welcome back to reality, end of the holidays…
We arrived home by those boring roads and had one day to rest.
I remembered Ireland as a very nice country with welcoming people, and I found a wonderful country with wonderful people…
Honeymoon trip: 3599,3km of Happiness.
V’s
