Monday July 21, 2014

We were up early had a good breakfast and on the road at 8:15.  It was a tough ride today.  It started with a 15 km ride negotiating city traffic to get out of Dublin.  Fortunately, Dublin has lots of cycle lanes.  We had to work our way across the city from east to west and then up through the Wicklow Mountains.  Once we had cleared the city we started to climb almost immediately.  It wasn’t too bad to start with and then it got progressively worse.  On one road a lady stopped and suggested we turn around and take another road as it wasn’t as steep.  We decided to press on but the hill got really steep (16%) and we were off and pushing the bikes.  Up and down we went for the next 10 kms and we hadn’t really got into the Mountains yet.  At one intersection we chatted to another lady motorist who told us the next section was downhill for a while it was known locally as Devil’s Elbow and then it kicked up again and we would have another steep climb similar to the 16% hill we had already climbed.

We decided to take the easier route and headed towards Enniskerry.  Enniskerry was a pretty town, where we were going to have some lunch, but realized we had forgotten to go to the bank in Dublin and only had 3 EUs.  We shared a sandwich and then carried on to the next town where there was supposed to be an ATM.  We eventually found an ATM in Roundwood.  We bought some water and another sandwich.

We were looking at the map we had the choice of two routes from Roundwood to Rathdrum.  I asked a nice fella which would be the better route, meaning the less hillier route. He said they were both about the same but the R route was busy with buses, the L route was quieter.  We took the L route, within the first 2 ks we met two logging trucks, but after that it was quieter and a lovely route.

We came into Rathdrum and found the campsite straight away.  It is a very busy family site with lots of things to do for the kids.  It is very expensive 24 EUs for a bit of grass, everything else you pay for, even the showers and power are extra.  Why people accept these appalling services is beyond us.  Now we are surrounded by the smell of campfires, and burnt sausages and tired screaming toddlers.

Tomorrow we should be in Rosslare and plan to take the ferry back to the UK on Wednesday.  Hopefully we can get on a ferry as easily as we did coming from Troon to Larne.