Day 15

Saturday, August 19th
Donegal to Malin Head
133km

We made it!!!  We've cycled across Ireland!

Another fantastic ride today.  Great weather and spectacular scenery.  Wonderful.

The weather today was much like yesterday: ovrecast and cool in the morning with a threat of rain with bright, warm sun by the afternoon.

In the morning, we set off along the main N15 road through Barnesmore Gap.  At 5km, I followed the route off the N15 onto some sharply undulating side-roads.  Ryan and Jenn decided to stay on the flatter but less scenic main road.

Barnesmore Gap itsself was a true gap in the mountains, i.e. no steep climbs required.  There was, however, a long steady climb as we passed through it.

The climbing continued throughout the morning, as we rode through wide valleys of farmers fields with nice views of the surrounding mountains.  A highlight was the long, straight (read fast) decent into Letterkenny and subsequent steep climb back out.

After 60km we stopped for lunch at a gas station in Rathmelton.  I noticed that one of my tires was losing air, however we didn't have time to fix it because we were trying to catch a ferry.  Instead, I pumped in some more air and we sprinted 10km to Rathmullan.  In the end,  we arrived 8 mintues early for the 1:40pm ferry across Lough Swilly to Buncrana.  Phew!  The next ferry didn't leave until 3pm!

After repairing my flat on the ferry, we were ready to ride when we landed at 2pm. 

The R238 road out of Buncrana had some great views of large mountains.  At 80km the road climbed sharply up onto the moors.  It was lovely up there.  Vast open rolling fields of long grasses.  The pavement was new and smooth, and I flew along the rolling hills at 40km/h...stopping only for a few photos.

Decending into Cardonagh the end was near.  We rode through Malin and then along the coast before turning inland and climbing up some jagged, rocky cliffs that were covered in fuzzy green moss.

One last steep climb around the headland and we reached the end of Malin Head.  It was stunning scenery.  Waves crashed into the rocky coast while lumpy green rocks rose up from the water to form a series of differenthily layers.

We stopped for several photos before making the final decent and steep final climb up to the tall cement tower that marked the northern-most point of Ireland...Banba's Crown.  It was the end of the road, and a fitting end to a great ride across the country.  Similar to the signal hill climb at the end of my cross Canada trip...only with much nicer weather...and a slightly easier climb.

It felt good to have reached the end of the journey, although we still had to cycle the 15km back to Malin, where we are staying.  At 133km, it was the longest ride that Jenn had ever done.

Great day and a great way to end the trip.