This post recounts the third day of my Mizen Head to Malin Head cycle tour in Ireland with Peak Tours in June 2024. Read Day 2: Glengariff to Tralee

Today was a much easier day, though hillier than the route notes suggested. We left Tralee under heavy, dark clouds – yesterday afternoon’s sunshine had gone, but it was at least dry. We missed a turn in town – I ignored my Garmin’s insistent beeps, assuming the others charging on knew better. The Garmin was right…We were soon back on track, with views of the river Lee and the sea to the left.

We had a few climbs today, and the view above was the reward for the first: the stunning vista over Ballyheigue Bay. Once again I was left thinking how glorious this place would be on a sunny day – such a common experience in these islands…

A little later, we saw the road ahead climbing skywards, and braced ourselves for a workout. But we were spared: the Garmin beeped at us to turn right, and a more modest ascent awaited us. In truth the climbing today was easy, but I did feel sorry for Lucy, who was having trouble with the gears on her new bike. My mind went back to our tour of Umbria in 2004 when I was unable to use any of the bottom set of gears on my newish Cannondale hybrid.

On the first two days I’d noticed how prosperous the towns and villages had appeared. Today that changed, and we cycled past a lots of run down houses and ruined farms.

As we cycled towards the Shannon, I passed runner after runner coming the other way, and remembered that it was Saturday. It must have been a major event given the numbers taking part. Some of the runners seemed almost broken, barely walking. I was sure that my friend and colleague Louise from Dublin, a very strong runner, would have been right at the front! I was cycling on my own for much of the stretch to lunch, but enjoyed talking to Ian from Vancouver – one of the joys of these tours is meeting people from all over the world. Later, over lunch, I chatted about cycling Land’s End to John O’Groats (LEJOG) with one of our group. He said that Glastonbury was a low point for him, because of the poor accommodation. By contrast, I loved Street and Glastonbury on my LEJOG, but had a very jaundiced view of Kinross because there was no hot water in my hotel room. These individual experiences make a big difference.

We enjoyed an excellent lunch at the Swanky Bar in Tarbert, before a short ride to the ferry over the mighty Shannon, Ireland’s longest river.

I love taking my bike on a ferry, whether it’s a cross channel one as in my tour of Brittany in 1996 or much smaller cross river ferries such as the King Harry crossing in Cornwall on LEJOG in 2019. The Tarbert to Killimer ferry route across the Shannon was just three miles, but saved a very long ride via Limerick.

We spotted a group of cyclists from Armagh in Northern Ireland on the ferry, along with an Ulster Cycling support van. They overtook us at speed as we passed through Kilrush. Later, I found out that they were riding our Mizen to Malin route in four days, for charity. They were chatting to each other very loudly as they approached and passed us – so much so that until they came past I thought it must be an altercation…

In truth, today’s route was rather dull after the drama of the Dunloe Gap yesterday, but we had an enjoyable spell along a lane that had grass growing in the middle, which reminded me of a British bridleway. We also spotted a golf course owned by Donald Trump, just before the afternoon brew stop. But we were soon back on the main road that would take us to our destination, Spanish Point.

Above: making progress across County Clare: Rob, Julia and Lucy, photographed by Anna

All day, I’d been taking on trust the route notes that said we’d have 2,100 feet of climbing today. We passed that total before Kilrush, so the final climb towards the coast came as a shock. (The day’s final climbing totalled 2,756 feet.) At last we reached the Atlantic, at Quilty. It was rather a bleak scene, with drizzle greeting the final mile or so to Spanish Point. The name of our destination recalls the wreck of Spanish Armada warships on the Clare coast in 1588. The English authorities who occupied Ireland executed the survivors, not knowing that the Armada had already long been defeated.

We were staying in a modern motel tonight, the Bellbridge House Hotel. I popped over the road to take photos, seen above. Dinner was filling, if nothing else, and the place was doing a roaring trade on a Saturday evening. I was intrigued to hear Lucy talking about her unconventional 1970s London secondary school, whose head was Molly Hattersley, wife of the Labour cabinet minister Roy. I was intrigued as Dominic Sandbrook’s wonderful history of Britain in the seventies, Seasons in the Sun, recounted the story of the school, quoting one teacher saying, ‘I don’t think kids should be made to come to school. It turns schools into prisons.’ It was a fascinating end to an uneventful day.

Read Day 4: Spanish Point to Galway

The day’s stats

65.5 miles, 2,756 feet climbing, 4 hours 30 mins cycling, average speed 14.5 mph.

The day’s highlights video