Clifden Trip

Had a great time in Clifden, Clifden is about 5 hours from Belfast on the West coast of Ireland and has some of the most beautiful coastline in the country. We travelled down on the Friday night and spent the evening outside the pub in the town centre watching the acrobats rehearse on a crane for the parade on the Saturday night. Clifden is famous for a couple of reasons.
Firstly its where Alcock and Brown landed after being the first people to make a non stop crossing of the Atlantic, its also where the film the quiet man was filmed. With these two facts running round my head I headed out of the town up Sky road. With a tail wind behind me the climbing was easy and the views were spectacular. The weather wasn’t great, but it didn’t matter at all. I was just enjoying being somewhere besides Belfast on my bike. I made a steep descent towards the end of the peninsula and then headed back towards the town with the hills offering me some protection from the wind that had aided my journey earlier on.
I didn’t have long to ride so this 14 mile circular route was ideal and I got back to the bed and breakfast in time to see my juggling partner Chris getting up (He’s not a morning person). The weather got worse as the day went on – probably the after effects of the hurricanes in America. So we had to do the shows in a big school hall, but the crowds are always great fun whenever we do a show down here, its definitely one of my favourite festivals in Ireland.
We finished the day off in the Alcock and Brown Hotel drinking Guiness, listening to a folk band and watching a hen party get more rowdy. A great weekend all round then, plus I got my picture in the Guardian!