Northallerton Advanced Bikes (NAB)

[Big-Bill]

England – Scotland – Ireland – Wales
1371 miles in 9 days

Just back from a week’s touring, here’s the route we took:-



Friday August 10th, we set off for Stranraer to get the ferry, we had every kind of weather from bright sunshine during the 175 miles across the Pennines and into South West Scotland. Stena Line took us across to Belfast on the high speed service, see http://tinyurl.com/39b4sv

Here we are waiting to board the ferry at Stranraer:-



We had a B&B booked near Larne, so we did battle with Belfast’s rush hour traffic and found our stop at Ashmore House - http://www.ashmorehouse.co.uk


On Saturday we visited a friend before picking up the A2 Antrim coast road, recommended as a 'must ride' by several folk. Indeed it is!

The northern part of our route looks like this:-



We found a B&B in Ammon House in Balleycastle:-



On Sunday we continued up the Antrim coast to visit Giants Causeway, very impressive..



See http://tinyurl.com/3cvpa5 for more details, worth a visit but gets busy!

We were away before the crowds started to arrive.

Our route took us across Derry and into the Irish Republic at Strabane.
The A38 suddenly becomes the N15, road signs are in Km, and road marking become ‘continental’, oh yes, and petrol is a lot cheaper!



We followed the N15 to Donegal, where we stopped for coffee…



We then continued South eventually finding a nice B&B in Sligo, St Anthonys..



Sligo sits on the river Erne:-



On Monday we continued South, though County Mayo and on into Galway, a busy city!
We were keen to get into County Clare, as we wanted to see the Burren, an area of Karst scenery:-



The landscape is very impressive and we had good weather too!



More on the area at http://tinyurl.com/37ttrn

We found another excellent B&B at Miltown Malbay, Rock Mount…



On Tuesday we crossed County Clare and took the car ferry across the Shannon (see http://tinyurl.com/23r82c)

We had another GS for company on the ferry, also 2up, from Italy…



Rain greeted our arrival in County Kerry, along with around 20 Goldwing’s waiting to take the ferry north.

Here is more detail of the southern part of our trip…



We continued south and west through lots of rain, via Tralee and on towards the Ring of Kerry.
It's the coast road around the peninsular (see http://tinyurl.com/3gm9f ), nice and very popular with tourists!

We found a nice B&B at Derry East Farm near Sneem…



Plenty of good eating places in Sneem too!

On Wednesday we followed the N70 to Kenmare, where it was market day, which required the Garda to have a bike on duty, a Deauville…



Not that it made any difference, there was gridlock!

We did as the Irish do, and stopped for coffee.

We continued south on the N71 over the mountains, some spectacular views…



And into Bantry bay…



After lunch in Bantry, we took the N71 and then the R586 towards the south coast, eventually finding a B&B near Roscarbery, Cumar Dearg..



With a spectacular view from our bedroom window..



Thursday took us east across almost the whole of the South coast, some more good views..



Under the river on the Cork ring road..



And on towards Waterford..



Waterford was very busy with traffic, we were glad to get through and once beyond New Ross, we began looking for B&B’s.
For the first time all week it took nearly an hour to find one! We must have picked the wrong lanes to ride along…



Eventally we found one in Enniscorthy, Rose Crest…



Friday was ferry day, so after a quick visit to Wexford we headed for Rosslare to get the ferry to Fishguard.

Here we are waiting to board another Stena express service…



We were first on to the ship…



Just a couple of hours later we were disembarking in South West Wales..



Where petrol is a lot more expensive, good job we filled up at Rosslare!

We reached our final stop at Wervil Grange Farm at about 18.30



See (http://tinyurl.com/2gruwb )

On Saturday we trekked across Wales, onto the M56, the M6, M60, M62, and finally the M1, 260ish miles mostly in the rain!

A really good trip, Irish B&B’s are cheap, (around €35 per person) the food is excellent, and just a little more expensive than here in the UK, most places seem to do really good grub!

Hope you enjoyed our tale!

Bill & Dot

[Tippytots]

Looks like a really nice tour...you seemed to find some good places to stay too....nice scenery. Glad the weather was on the whole pretty good.

[Stella H]

Looks lovely! Must put on my 'to do' list.