You know that rain I mentioned yesterday? Well every time I woke up last night I could hear the rain coming down. Then it would stop, and it would start again. I thought it was going to be a very wet day... When I finally crawled out of bed and looked out of the window, I could see a big gray cloud over the house, and blue sky all around. By the time I went down for breakfast, the blue sky was over the house, no rain. But then as I was eating it started again. Given the on again off again rain at the start of the day, I didn't have too many hopes for a dry ride. It wasn't bad though. I went through some rain early in the day that caused me to grab for my rain jacket. It wasn't heavy rain, but I would have been pretty wet if I didn't wear my jacket, and it's just too cool to start the day wet.
Last night I thought about moving my breakfast time back to 8, but I didn't do it. It turns out leaving it was really the right decision for two reasons - Maureen said she overslept, didn't wake up until 8:20, and, probably more importantly, a slightly later start worked better with the crazy rain day. I had a good breakfast, and a good send-off by my hosts. I left the house wearing shorts and a jersey, no extra layers. Not too long after I started - after I walked up the steep little hill leaving Ardara - it started raining. Rain jacket on. And for some reason I turned and looked behind me at that point to see a beautiful rainbow. That's a good way to start riding in the rain. The rain stopped fairly quickly, but I kept the jacket on long enough for it to dry out. I stashed it back in the trailer where it stayed for the rest of the day. I did ride through more rain, but each time it stopped before I felt like it was time for the rain jacket. And a lot of the rain was sun showers. Looking back on the day, it was probably cool enough that I should have been wearing my knee warmers, and there were times when the wind vest would have helped. But somehow I never stopped for those extra layers.
The ride (again) was beautiful. I rode parallel to the Blue Stack Mountains, and I suppose that the relatively long uphill was heading across and up the mountains. That's what I'd guess anyway. The uphill started in Glenties. It was never a steep grade, nothing that required my granny gear, but noticeable. I think it was about 8 miles up, and 8 miles down. Unfortunately the downhill wasn't as much fun as it could have been because the road surface was pretty awful. It was still a rest, just a vibrating one. It was a solitary ride for the most part, on a little road with only an occasional car passing. At one point I started to see people walking; soon after I saw the church they were leaving. There weren't too many houses up there, but I guess many of the church-goers (wait, isn't it Saturday?) walk rather than driving their cars. I was still heading uphill, so I just waved and carried on.
It's funny. Although today's ride was quiet and solitary, it didn't feel desolate like that road on the day I was headed to Belleek. I suppose it was the fact that there were obvious farms along the road, and signs of life.
I finally reached a flat part of the hill, and had to do a double-take, because up ahead on the road was a sheep jam! The sheep were heading up the road toward me, and they were taking up more than the width of the road! It turns out that there were 3 people with them, as well as one dog, and they were directing the sheep forward. The guy on my side of the sheep told me to just ride forward and to stay to one side of the road. The sheep did move! That kept me laughing for a while - except for all the sheep crap I managed to pick up on my tires. Yuck. Unlike my normal behavior, I spent the next hour or so aiming at the puddles of water on the road to try to get my tires cleaned off. It worked!
Tony told me that the distances on the road signs are often incorrect, and I saw an interesting example of that. As I left Glenties, I saw a sign for Ballybofey that indicated it was 23 kilometers away. Hmmm, according to my direction it was 22 miles away at that point, which is closer to 37 kilometers. I rode 8 miles, another road came in, and look, there was a sign for Ballybofey saying that it was 23 kilometers away - again! That was much closer to correct at that point, although I did see one more sign saying 23 kilometers before the distance began to decrease.
Balleybofey was my stop-and-calm-my-stomach stop. I woke up with a queasy stomach today, which I think was from a combination of fried food from last night and food that was too rich the night before. That rich stuff really tasted good, but I knew it wasn't a good idea as soon as I finished it! I took some Pepto Bismol this morning, but it appeared I needed more. So I stopped for a cup of tea and a banana, and I took some more Pepto - and somehow my stomach returned to it's normal self. I hate it when that happens! Going back to cereal and toast instead of the full Irish breakfast helped, but I guess I have to make better choices for dinner!
I headed out of Ballybofey, and as I passed two cars on the side of the road, one of the people said "you're beating us". I didn't know we were racing, but of course I stopped to chat. There were two (gray-haired) couples and a cute little dog. One of the men came over and asked if my bike was a folding bike, then said he'd never seen one before. We talked about my bike and about my trip, and then he asked if he could take a picture. So he now has a picture of a Bike Friday Air Glide for his picture album. They were from County Armaugh in Northern Ireland. They asked if I was visiting there on my trip, and I told them that I've been wandering back and forth across the border since I arrived.
I took my last turn of the day to head from Castlefinn 6 miles south to Castlederg. And, surprise, surprise, the road immediately turned up. The first 4 miles were at a slight uphill grade and into a headwind. Ouch! Not what I really wanted at the end of the day, but of course I kept riding. The last 2 miles were downhill, which means I'm going to have to climb out of here in the morning. Oh well...
I arrived at the Derg Arms - the bar, restaurant, guest house that is my home for the night. I have to admit that I was pretty concerned about it when I walked into the bar to ask about my room. The bar was very smoky and very loud, and all I could think was that my room would be over that noise. I was pleasantly surprised when the woman came up to show me my room. First we took the bike to the back of the building where I could lock it up in a safe place. When I asked if I could get back out there to clean and re-lube the bike (we'd wandered through the guest house dining room, office, and kitchen to get to the back yard) she said "sure, just come out the same way - and there's a hose there you can use too." Then she led me to my room on the third floor, which is a lot more modern than I expected after seeing the bar. I actually have a phone, and I can dial up to iberpass.com to upload my journal entries. Very cool! Comfortable bed, hot shower, I'm all set.
The dining room here appears to be the only restaurant in town. Luckily it's separate from the bar, and no smoking is allowed. I had vegetable lasagna for dinner, which seemed to be more like a ratatouille than a lasagna. Of course the only protein in the dish came from the cheese. It also came with a green salad topped with coleslaw ( a bit odd, but it tasted good), a pasta salad, and a potato salad. Interesting combination, and of course I ate everything. I followed that with a pot of tea and desert for a change. They had what was called a chocolate orange gateau. Sounded interesting to me, and it was. It was a very thin layer of chocolate cake topped by a thicker layer of orange something. Suze, I'm sure you can help me out here. It wasn't a pudding or a custard, but it reminded me of something like that (although set a bit harder). Whatever it was, it was good!
Tomorrow's ride is supposed to be a short one, but I think I may extend it a bit by taking a side trip to Strabane. I was looking through some brochures in the lobby, and it looks like there is some interesting metal sculpture there.
