Our journey began from home on the Welsh borders, two bikes, two riders, Honda NC750S (Nancy) and Suzuki SFV650 Gladius (Gladys).
Travelling first to Aberystwyth for breakfast and then on to Fishguard for the ferry to Roslaire in southern Ireland.
After a night’s rest in Roslaire, day two found us on the roads to Killarney, encountering terrible roads in Co Cork, but a vast improvement on entering Co Kerry.
We’d booked four nights in Killarney with a chance to explore the area. We did a figure of eight ride, taking in Molls gap, Kenmare, Glengarriff, up the Healey Pass, back through Kenmare and Clonkeen to return to Killarney.
Following day was a horse and wagon (jaunting)ride,(one horse power only), through the large park and on to Ross castle, we enjoyed it so much that the day after we actually walked most of the route to be able to spend more time exploring what we hadn’t seen on the previous day.
Day six and we were off again, up the west coast to Tarbert for the Shannon ferry and up to the mountains of Moher, then via the famous corkscrew and the Burren we finished our day in Kinvarra.
Day seven, up early, breakfast tucked away and we’re again on the road,
Roscommon, Longford, Cavan,and Ballygawley next stop.
Day eight, Belfast ferry to Cairnryan and up the Scottish west coast and a rendezvous with an old chum from the past living in Dunfermline, so a wine and dining evening with loads to catch up on, only downside was that the local midges took a liking for the wife and left her with a few biting memories.
Next day and traveling down through Kilmarnock and Dumfries, encountering beautiful countryside on our way to Troutbeck in the lake district, an accident on the Penrith main junction found us delayed by nearly an hour, and the police supplying drinks to everyone due to the very hot conditions.
Our last day had a slight change as the kirkstone pass had been closed yet again, so we re-routed via Keswick, Ambleside on to Coniston, to drop on to M6 for journey home.
Only 1200miles, but thoroughly enjoyable as our usual destinations would be Spain and France.
Les & Olwen Jones.
