Touring Tales: The Great Western

August 11, 2024August 21, 2024
by Dave Anderson

Last autumn I toured Wild Atlantic Mayo and got so thoroughly rained on that I’m still emptying water out of my ears. With the arrival of the Irish Summer, I decided to take another trip out to the Great Western Greenway.

The Great Western Greenway, like any Great Western, is a journey of discovery, with beautiful backdrops, a varied cast of characters, some challenges, and maybe even some lessons learned along the way.

Once Upon a Time into the West

This hero’s journey begins in Navan – home to the Boyne Valley to Lakelands Greenway, located just ten minutes by car from the town. From Navan, we head South into the blazing Irish sun, to the heritage town of Trim, along a fairly quiet back road to Robinstown, past historic Bective abbey, and it’s quiet country roads all the way to Enfield where you join the Royal Canal Greenway.

There are whispers of a cycling route being created between Navan and Trim, going by the name of “Pathfinder”. The name is presumably meant as a joke, because you can’t find any information about the cycle path.

At Enfield there’s a busy outpost beside the Royal Canal Greenway entrance for travellers to stock up on provisions and use the loo. I don’t know why they called it the Applegreen when The Royal Flush was right there. The railroad station provides access across the entire country, from Dublin to Sligo.

Oh Me Oh My Mullingar

From Enfield, it’s a 42 kilometre ride to Mullingar beside the canal. If you’re lucky, you might find yourself racing a locomotive alongside the greenway. Shouting yeehaw at the train passengers is entirely optional. There are a couple of saloons along the way, but if you’re travelling in the morning you’ll be out of luck. The local natives seem friendly, and have erected a statue to venerate an ancient soothsayer by the name of Joe Dolan.

Pale Rider

With a powerful telescope, you could see the entire length of this greenway, the Old Rail Trail from Mullingar to Athlone. If you like old train tracks and straight lines, you’ll love this greenway. It’s 46 kilometres of smooth tarmac all the way, with plenty of trees and greenery providing welcome shade for those of us from the paleface clan.

Along the way, new enterprises have popped up to service weary travellers. The old train station at Moate is a particularly vibrant stopping-off point, and a welcome break from the wide open plains of Westmeath.

I’m already on my second tube of suncream. The curse of the gingers.

Red River

Attention Active Travel Teams. If you’d like to see how to connect a Greenway to the centre of your town, go look at Athlone.

Having spent two hours cycling in a straight line, the traveller is welcomed to Athlone by good signage, curvy connected paths, and a wide red route that brings you across the new pedestrian and cycle bridge. It’s something you might see in Copenhagen. Or Westmeath.

The 3:10 to Yuma

The railroad from Athlone brings you to Westport, and to the Great Western Greenway. The outdoor tribe are very much present on this train, heading out to the wild West for adventure.

Irish Rail provides a booking system, where you can indicate that you’d like to bring your bike. Upon selecting this option, someone in Irish Rail sees that there are more bikes than available spaces, does nothing, and takes a well-earned nap, leaving the bicycle tourists to figure it out. Word arrived recently from back East that some railroad coaches have modern dual-use carriages, where one’s steed can be easily tied up alongside several more. But not here, not today.

After apologising on behalf of Ireland, those of us with bikes figure out how to cram three bikes into two spaces. Somewhere, an Irish Rail staff-member swats a fly and snores contentedly under their sombrero.

Get off your horse and drink your latté

Despite being out in the wild west, there was civilised company to be found. In the centre of Westport I met two fellow gunslingers – Mairéad Forsythe, chair of the board of the Irish Cycling Campaign, and Kieran Ryan, organiser of 15-Minute Westport. Thanks to a clever native who used a strategically-placed bench to create a respite from motor vehicles, were able to sit and take refreshments at a small outdoor area by the town clock.

Westport: Come for the coffee, stay for the beans

For a Few Dollars More

As a local guide used his expertise to shepherd us from Westport town out to the Greenway. Along the way we picked up another traveller, confusedly looking for the route. My kingdom for a signpost.

Once reaching the greenway, a travelling bicyclist can mosey along to the outskirts of Newport, where they find themselves having to cross a fast road to reach the paint-protected cycle lane, which then disappears after a few metres.

How is it that the Greenways are so amazing, but connections to them seem to be designed by a distracted intern? It can only be that the people creating the greenway are from a higher realm, perhaps outer space. Greenway designers are from Mars, urban designers Uranus?

Unforgiven

The stretch of greenway from Newport to Mallaranney is breathtaking, yet reaching it from Newport town takes your breath away for entirely different reasons. When thinking “how can we get families and inexperienced tourists to cycle to the greenway” it’s hard to understand how the solution is “let them cycle among trucks and farm traffic on a national road”.

And, breathe. This stretch of greenway has such amazing views, you’ll be spending half the time pausing to take photos. The other half of the time will be saying hi to the many, many people on bikes. There are so many people on bikes, you’ll quickly run out of “hi”, “hello”, “howaya” and similar greetings. We need the cycling equivalent of a country driver raising a finger off the steering wheel to greet people we meet on the trail.

Mallaranney feels like a “greenway town”. Lots of places to eat, tables to picnic at, racks to lock your bike. I had to ask someone to pinch me. Next time I’ll just go with the usual “hi, hello, howaya”. A newly-restored (train station?) has public WCs and a free water station to fill your bottles. Amazing.

A Time to Keel

The landscape takes centre stage here, and it’s jaw-dropping. Travellers are advised that while appreciating the vista, keep your mouth closed. A fly going down your throat at 20km/h doesn’t care that you were appreciating the natural beauty of this amazing country. This does solve the problem of how to greet other travellers – coughing uncontrollably and croaking “fly!”.

All travellers pass through Achill Sound, a border town of sorts, separating the bland mainland with the raw coastal island. There’s a smartly-designed extra-wide pathway here, with greenway markings and signage, bringing you out of the town and onto what is currently the final stretch of the greenway, including a raised boardwalk across the barrens to Cashel. Epic stuff. Mouth closed.

From here you’re on regional roads, with little in the way of hard shoulders. Without exception, every driver gave me the maximum space, and passed me by overtaking on the opposite side of the road. Bloody tourists.

After a long day in the saddle, the hill leading to Keel feels like a mountain. But from the top, the view is spectacular, and as you freewheel down to Keel, you see the dramatic cliffs facing down the teal waters and the pale sandy beach. And, scene.

Hawk Dooagh

And this is where the journey ends, at the end of the world in the village of Dooagh, home to the Westernmost bar in Europe. As I rested overnight, before making the return journey, I wondered if people here ever get tired of the wild atlantic views? The last sound I heard was the crashing of the untamed waves, as I drifted off to dream of electric sheep.