Blogging at 22:00 on Tuesday 15th August from intended overnighting spot N 51.83300°, W 09.13170° / http://maps.google.com/maps?q=loc:51.83300%2C-09.13170
Yet another easy travel day but for a diversion into Macroom to pick up some Ibuprofen for Emma. It's a nice enough little town but the roads in and around it were steep and nadgery. The situation wasn't helped by a bloke who'd parked a flat back van and trailer down one of the narrow roads through town leaving absolutely no chance of getting past in a normal panel van: let alone a waggon. Pretty much the whole section of town was brought to a halt whilst the fellow responsible was located. As he returned to the van he was seemingly scolded by a fearsome looking matriarch who had taken to foot after being thwarted in the growing queue of cars behind us. He seemingly knew better than to cross this particular mammy. Even we - on the same side as her - had the good sense to studiously avoid eye contact as she strode thunderously past on the return to her car.
The Ibuprofen - curiously only available in pharmacies in the Republic - came in handy. I may one day return to Macroom but it won't be in anything even slightly underpowered, over 6m long, 2m wide and 2.5m high.
For no particular reason we headed to the general area we're now intending to overnight, parked up pretty early and then did our own thing running and biking: Emma ran, I biked. With the intimacy with an area running and biking brings, it feels like we're very much in Gaeltacht country.
It's hard to fathom exactly why some places just 'feel' like Gaeltacht areas, but even without hearing anyone speak there can be a really palpable undertone of differentishness.
The exact spot we've settled on to kip (pic) is typical pine marten habitat and offers good open views for miles around but, weirdly, in spite of lots of varied flora and topography there's hardly any fauna of any description to be seen.
At least the downtime gave me a chance to juggle the logistics of the next few days that include (if it can be made to work) quite a bit of back-and-forthing, around the southwest corner, boat trips and a parkrun.
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