We could not leave Sligo without searching out some music last night. This was really easy as it was at a nearby pub named "Shoot The Crows" and recommended to us. We arrived at 10pm (start time for music) to find 3 large Garda outside with an even larger person who was being quizzed. Inside two guys had just starting playing and the bar was filling up. One spectator was playing annoyingly with his phone as if he was bored. A petite Chinese girl with a big black box arrived and sat down beside Dagmar. Clearly she was very nervous. She asked Dagmar to look after the box as she went to the loo. When she returned, she opened the box and inside was a
bodhran, an Irish drum for Celtic folk music. She joined the two musicians. This girl was a revelation as her nervousness vanished and she played the bodhran with vigour. I found myself mesmorised watching her hands which worked at lightning speed.
The cycle route to Donegal is the
North West Trail and we now enter a cycle tourist's paradise. Imagine leaving with a mountain to your right, then entering a landscape of wild flowers, trees everywhere, rocky crags and tiny rushing rivers. This is the North West Trail. But this is not all. Ahead are Blue Stack mountains of Donegal, to the right are the hills of Fermanagh while to the left is the great Atlantic Ocean. Amazingly we encounter very little traffic and only small numbers of dogs. We cycle on little lanes, some with grass in the middle, others at the water's edge and on one occasion we cycle over the beach with Atlantic breakers to our side. We hear the wind, birdsong and the noise of our tyres. These are a few images to tempt you to bring your bikes, camera and binoculars here.
Tomorrow, we are little undecided on our destination but we think that we will follow the North West Trail to Strabane, then leave it and continue to Derry.
We cycled 46 miles today which seems low but on the other hand it is a slow bike ride
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