Friday 23rd July
Thursday was a rest day in the beautiful surroundings of our Country House hotel in Enniskillen. We spent the day sightseeing in the town, watching the boats as they came into dock at the jetty on the hotel grounds and playing golf again within the hotel grounds.
We set off at 9.45am on our cycle to Derry. The weather was just perfect. Not far from our hotel we entered a holiday park. We read a sign from Sustrans - The cycling organisation from the U.K. which stated that this cycle track was exclusive to cyclists and walkers and went through hills, lakes and valleys for 85 miles. We decided to leave the holiday park and cycle track and head on a more direct route to Derry.
Fermanagh tourism is best known for its picturesque views of Lough Erne and its surrounding mountains. There were several well kept picnic areas along the lake and we stopped off at one of these to observe the views and have refreshments.
Our route brought us through the town of Kesh with its boats and bridges and then we headed into rich farmland slightly hilly but most notable for the density of animals on the land. Northern Ireland has traditionally been noted for its productive farming methods - perhaps the protestant ethic coming into play. We stopped at a crossroads pub near Castlederg for a lunch break, the hospitality of the publican was exceptional.
Our route from here brought us through the Sperrin mountains which had some really challenging fun climbs. The roads we took were deserted of other traffic, the scenery was beautiful, the weather brilliant - life does not get much better than this.
We entered Derry at 6.30pm and found our Bed and Breakfast which was on the Buncrana road. The accomodation was very poor and dirty - I would give it a score of 2/10. Derry has a very vibrant night life so our entire group went out on the town. A great night was had by all. The passion of the Derry people for their music consumed us all and we returned to our kip around 2am