CHARITY CYCLE: DUBLIN TO GALWAY - LOW LIE THE FIELDS
Yes, I sang John Denver's classic and yes I did feel like I belonged. It was proper full-on bóithrÃn (pronounced 'boreen') defined as a narrow, frequently unpaved, rural road found in Ireland.
For all of our other cycles on this cross country caper, we had worked out a stopping point in advance, to break up the journey. This time, the night before, as we poured over Google maps, we couldn't find a single shop/cafe/restaurant/icecream vendor on our route. That should have been a warning bell, but we decided to do what every Irish person does when confounded, we shrugged our shoulders and decided "Ah sure, it'll work itself out, we'll be grand".
We powered our way around 36km in the beating heat without a single stop. There wasn't even a sniff of a cornetto. However, it was a beautiful cycle, the whole thing was right out of a Disney does Ireland playbook. The fields were green with envy, the dry stone walls were gleaming, at one point a stallion of a horse galloped beside Dom for the length of a field, it was just us and Mother Ireland, there wasn't a sinner to be found.
I had picked this particular route today because I wanted to get away from traffic, it also promised to have 'fewer hills'. What a bold faced liar Google can be, good luck finding 'fewer hills', try 'all the hills', we were in a permanent state of undulation.
This is how I discovered the hard truth that I am the weak link of our merry band. Roisin and Dom power up hills like the beasts that they are, I like to work my way down my gears and poodle up the precipice, in one of those will-she-wont-she-make-it kinda ways. In my defense, going uphill can be difficult with heart failure, Nonetheless, I do manage it and feel fine so maybe my body has learned to compensate.
Despite the bumpy ride and Dom lobbing his phone into the air accidentally and having to scramble around in the hedgerow to find it, we had a blast.
We made it to Athenry and hit the pool as Roisin is indefatigable and requires more of an energy burn than a 20 miler cycle can offer. We mooched into town to get ice cream (as the mini heatwave continues), Dom got talking to an old chap in a shop who asked Dom if he was Australian. This confusion happens to Dom frequently and amuses me to no end. I don't think he sounds remotely Australian but as Roisin pointed out, he does come across as much chirpier than you'd expect for a Brit.
Dom and his new mate got into a long conversation about Australia. It turns out that not only did all of the man's grandchildren live there now but he himself had lived there in the 1970s, he had been a cop in Sydney! He and his wife had moved back to Athenry when they had kids, to give them a simpler life they had enjoyed growing up. As is often the case in Ireland, the children grow up and move away to find their own excitement thousands of miles away. Dom asked him if he had been to Oz recently, he said he hadn't as his wife had died a number of years back and he didn't want to travel without her. When I overheard this I was struck by the sadness and loss and had to turn away as the tears ran to my eyes.
One thing I had noticed on our cycle, from leaving Dublin to arriving in Galway, every day little white butterflies join me for part of my cycle. I know it is because they are in season, but when Lochlann had passed away, within moments of his death, the Hospice placed butterflies on the door of his room to represent his spirit moving to another place.
I like to think Lochlann has been with me on this cycle.
Last day tomorrow - Athenry to Galway city.
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