HH Challenge Day Four, Continued (or Beating Banagher)

Destination #4, Banagher

"That beats Banagher.  And Banagher beats the devil."

This is what a lady in Connemara said to me on my way to Claddaghduff, when I told her where I was heading after that.  I'd only ever heard the start of that expression before, so I'm going to try and fit that into a conversation somewhere soon.

I didn't get an amazing night's sleep on my island, it's been nearly a year since I was last in a tent and I think it takes a bit of getting used to (basically I've got soft) so I only got about three hours sleep, if even that.  I gave up trying to sleep at about five and decided to explore my island in the dawn light.  The night before, the couple from the next tent had told me that somewhere on the island were the remains of an old church in a hole, so I wanted to find them.  First, though I went down to examine the freshwater lake in the middle of the island, where I was met by a placid heard of cows, who looked on as I took various artsy (well...I was trying to be artsy) shots before heading off to tour the rest of the island.  To be honest I don't think that the rabbit that the guy with the shotgun dispatched will be missed, the island is crawling with them, all scattering as I came along.  Just as I reached the north shore of the island I saw a fox disappear over a hill.  Must have won some fox lottery or something - this place is a fox's paradise.

I took loads of photos (my method of photography is to take dozens of rubbish photos in the hope of accidentally getting a good one - although out here the scenery does most of the hard work, so I think they all turned out alright) as I trekked through fields and over rocks, before finally finding the ruins of the church, right down in a hollow.  Hundreds more photos will have hopefully yielded a decent shot.

Enforcing the lifeguard height restrictions...

Made very good time across the country - when I told the couple who carried me to Letterfrack at the start of the day where I was going, they were dubious about whether or not I'd make it to Banagher before the nightfall.  I assured them that I had every faith that I would.  

It was a very close thing.

Hitched back through Leenane, through Cong and Headford, and on towards Tuam and Athlone.  A good few lifts, when I told them where I was off to, asked why I hadn't gone via Galway, but my reasoning was that once I got to Galway I was very likely to get stuck on an entrance to the motorway or find everyone turning off and not picking me up.  Or going too fast to see me.  Wrought with problems, the Galway way would be.  I got as far as Athlone in good time, and the gent who'd picked me up (who took pity on me walking at the side of the road as he'd just returned from walking 200k of the Camino de Santiago - something I'd never heard of until a year or two ago, and now I'm hearing of a lot of people doing it, or wanting to do it) dropped me off on the Ballinasloe road - we'd both examined the map and agreed that I was better off thumbing towards Ballinasloe as far as the turn off to Shannonbridge, where I'd then hitch back towards Banagher.

How wrong we were.  I walked about 4-5K in the direction of Ballinasloe finding a good hitching spot, and standing there for a while before moving on.  So many people would point to indicate that they were turning off, which was enormously frustrating as I was also hoping to turn off.  I must have been about two hours there, before dropping into a wee shop, selling everything from clothes to sweets, to ask for cardboard and to stock up on sugars - chocolate, a refresher bar and two cola bottles.  I had a bit of a chat with the lady behind the counter, who had been working there all here life, and was now 70, but didn't look a bit of it.  There was no till, just a little wooden drawer which she took my change out of after doing the sums in her head.  She reckoned that I'd be better off thumbing back towards Athlone and out towards Cloghan.  I said I was sure my new sign would make all the difference.

It didn't.  Waited for another half an hour, getting even more frustrated, before finally deciding to hitch back towards Athlone after all (I dropped into the shop again before I did to let her know she was probably right), and was picked up by the second car - a lady who was listening to her Greek language CDs, but who interrupted her lesson to pick me up.  She wasn't really going my way (not at all, actually) but we were talking about all sorts of things, and in the end she dropped me in Cloghan, pretty much exactly in the opposite direction to the one she wanted to go.  I owe her a lot.

Was not waiting long in Cloghan at all, before I was picked up by a really nice fella who dropped me off outside the hostel in Banagher.  He said he was pretty sure it was open.  None of the doors were, though, so I asked in a pub and they said that it had been closed for the last twelve years.  The sent me down to a B&B down the road - no vacancies - so I returned and they directed me to another B&B, round a corner and up a hill.  I got lost and ended up plodding past the Banagher Concrete factory, and up to some more houses before realising that I was probably not in the right place. I knocked on the door of a house with the light on, and got more directions again.  I was just on my way back the way I'd come when the door of the house reopened and the girl I'd been talking to re-emerged and offered to drive me there - I think I looked pretty pathetic, so she'd taken pity on me.  By the time she dropped me off at Dun Cromain B&B, I had no energy left, I had a shower and collapsed into bed soon after, absolutely knackered.

But I had beaten Banagher.