Today’s weather is nothing short of the Full Irish, a soaking wet and windy day as we ride along the Great Western Greenway, a former rail line turned cycling path. The trail infrastructure is excellent and the route is gorgeous, from what we can tell peering out from under our raincoats. During rain breaks, we do catch a few glimpses of the Nephin Beg Mountains in the distance, part of the Wild Nephin National Park, which we will traverse in a few days.

The last 10 km are especially challenging as we ride straight into a headwind that our weather app tells us is a westerly gusting at almost 50 km/hr. At times, just maintaining forward momentum without getting blown off the road is a challenge.

On days like today, we try to just keep going, so lunch consists of a quick stop under the eves of a SuperValu grocery store, where we wolf down sandwiches and chat with a friendly couple dutifully returning their recyclables for store credit at an automated kiosk. At 15 cents per returned container, very little trash gets tossed on the roadside in Ireland.

We arrive in the small beach side town of Keel and head for the wood fired saunas to which our friend John has pointed us. Getting into a hot cedarwood sauna after being wet and cold all day is blissful. Even better is 15 minutes later, pink from the heat, sprinting across the sand and plunging into the North Atlantic. The clean, cold and briney water is shockingly invigorating. We spend an hour alternating between the sauna and cold plunges in the sea and feel alive and restored.

Refreshed, we make our way to tonight’s B&B. A few days ago we stayed at a hotel I referred to as swanky, which it was in a very understated and refined way. Tonight’s accommodations might also be described by some as swanky, but in a low level Russian oligarch inspired by Mar-a-Lago kind of way. We settle right in, draping wet cycling clothes on the Rococo furniture.