Dublin has a certain smell and feel, like a mixture of burnt coal, and decomposing rubbish. It is nearly always cloudy and melancolic. Everyone talks big about Galway being the place to go and once the mercury hit 4 degrees I pack up and take the motorway across the country for 3 hours. The hostel I stayed at was 8 euro a night, evidence of Irelands economic woes. 5 yeas prior I paid 30 euro a night in a Dublin hostel and you would have to get stuck into the Guinness to spend that in a day here now. I was shattered from a big weekend and elected to stay in and edit video logs rather than check out the Monday night Galway scene.

No matter how hard I try I can't get up, pack the bike and eat breakfast in the morning in less than an hour. An electric generator had been running on and off all night keeping me awake. The kind of noise that if it were constant your brain could shut out. This was the off and on noise that would wait and then come back just as I was drifting off and pull me from my almost sleep.


North Galway

I hit the road and head north with a few tips of roads to take to end up near Sligo. The hostel receptionist told me the story of the Doolough tragedy. During the great Irish famine hundred of people from a town called Louisberg took the walk to Delphi lodge on the rumour of rations only to find there were none. Starving and destitute they returned to Louisberg and many died on the pass on the return. I ride through the valley with this thought in mind stopping at the memorial. The hills rise up from a black lake that winds through the valley. I am almost at Louisberg and th sun pokes through the clouds.


The memorial.

I punch the address for the house I am staying at in Ireland into the GPS. It struggles to find it. Ireland needs to introduce post codes. For 2 hours I wind through small towns to get to Martin and Livas house. A Latvian couple who I found on couchsurfing the night prior. I arrive late at their house to a burning fire and food on the stove. We talk about Latvia, name days - where everyone in Latvia celebrates both their name day and their birthday each year. They give me a fish scale to put in my wallet - a Latvian tradition that is supposed to ensure you good fortune with finances.


Dinner with Liva and Martin

Martin has time in the morning to show me around the local area before headin off to his job at the local milk factory. I am keen to head to Slieve league today and set off. Another cold day but it doesn't seem to affect me, the sun is shining brightly and I think that is what keeps my spirits high.


Martin and I out in the morning exploring

I ride through various small Irish towns, all low set, though a Gaeltacht - an Irish speaking community, and a fishing village with a wicked stench that has hundreds of gulls flying overhead. Irish businesses have a consistency in signage that would have you thinking the entire country only has one signmaker.



The roads get smaller and rougher and I climb up the mountain to Slieve league. It doesn't present it's full glory until you reach the very end of the road. An old Irish couple walk past me while I admire the view.


Slieve League Cliffs

They are speaking Gaelic (or Irish as a lot of them prefer to call it) and break into english to tell me I am lucky to see the cliffs with the sun shining against them. After a few snacks I head for Letterkenny. A stroke of luck and I have more couchsurfers to stay with in Letterkenny. Two French girls...