No cockerels overnight last night, but there were long eared owls! They regaled us from the surrounding mixed beech and coniferous woodland with their eerie piercing shrieks sporadically during the early part of the night, and again after daybreak this morning once we'd started moving around. We couldn't see them, but they were very obviously watching us.
The morning's drive through the Wicklow mountains was mostly extremely agreeable with only the very narrow roads, passive-aggressive encroaching hedgerows, and occasional oncoming vehicle requiring ambiance-diverting attention.
We once again enjoyed many of the beautifully presented houses of rural Ireland. These are often detached bungalows sitting in their own discreet grounds, comfortably distanced from their nearest neighbours. The level of maintenance of both house and grounds routinely betrays great pride and civility. Few are outlandish or pretentious, they're just fastidiously presented functional living spaces and grounds. Lovely!
Post lunch we sought out some access to the fantastic resource that is the Waterford greenway. This converted former railway line is just a sublime corridor for both wildlife and benign human recreation. Emma had an out-and-back spin on the bike while I had a short and steady run. We've used this greenway before but from it's western termination point rather than this particular eastern section close to Waterford. It's a gem and legitimately comparable to the rural cycleways of the Netherlands.
All that remained post training was to pootle to a known overnighting spot about 45 mins away to do a bit of birding and to come down, but fate had other plans ...
We were driving down the N5 at about 40mph when I sensed something awry. I slowed down and pulled to the left and, sure enough, a few seconds later I realised the front offside tyre was almost fully deflated. A few seconds after that it had broken the bead and shredded, completely trashing the sidewall. Great.
The next hour was one of dripping-in-sweat toil spent swapping in the spare wheel. The size, awkwardness and weight of these things is just about at the limit of my spectacularly average physiology. I seem to recall the assembled unit is something in the region of 130kg. Whatever, It isn't fun.
This is the fifth friction, i.e. non-penetration puncture we've had over the years now but, significantly, the first whilst using innertubes of known age and provenance. This particular 16-year experiment is now officially over. The tyres are old and very well-worn anyway so when (if) we get back, I'll be scrapping the standard split-rims and going over to be custom made rims and tubeless tyres.
Anyway, somewhat shellshocked, filthy and battered we did belatedly make it to a known spot where we now are and coming down. It's been a pleasantly warm evening and as well as the more expected birds I've had a good sighting of a pair of siskins.
Post composed at 22:00 on Sunday 19th July from our intended overnighting spot N 52.04641°, W 07.66846° / http://maps.google.com/maps?q=loc:52.04641%2C-07.66846
