Boyne Valley to Lakelands Greenway & Beyond
It’s been a while since I’ve update my blog. It was great to get out again today for a good long spin! Greenways do what Greenways do! I took to the Boyne Valley to Lakeland Greenway, which follows the path of a disused railway. Long straight stretches. Nice day out for family cycles and lots of walkers close to the towns. I use Greenways as links to places I want to visit and they provide a great traffic free route. But there’s not a lot to see on these reinvented railways and if your goal is to see the country side and some nice scenery they can be restricted as they are enclosed between hedgerows or embankments. They serve a purpose and they are a great addition to the cycling and walking infrastructure.
This Greenway links Navan, County Meath with Kingscourt in Cavan, a distance of approximately 30kms. It was nice to visit places that I recognise the names of but have never been in such as Nobber and Kilmainham Wood. Before undertaking the route I checked my ordnance survey maps to see where else I might visit while up in these parts and Dún an Rí Forest park is situated just north of Kingscourt. It is a beautiful park with a lovely river walk.
The Park is not too far from the Monaghan border so after exiting on the opposite side (car park side) I pointed the bike in the direction of Magheracloone, a name that I always recall when I think of Monaghan football – Tomás and Damien Freeman are two of their most famous sons and of course the GAA pitch tragically disappeared into a sink hole! I didn’t quite go as far as Magheracloone and I took a shortcut along the edge of Cabra Castle Estate.
The back roads are my favourite cycling routes; lots of interesting things to catch the eye, winding roads, hills, virtually traffic free and it often feels like cycling back in time.
Today I managed to cycle in counties Meath, Cavan and Monaghan – which of course means I cycled in two provinces as well, Leinster and Ulster!
I was surprised at the number of old milestones that I saw along the route back towards Slane. This is just one example of many that I spotted:
I always had the perception that apart from Tara, Hill of Slane and Loughcrew that Meath was flat as a pancake… it isn’t and there was plenty of ups and downs as I made my way south towards Slane through Drumconrath and Syddan. I love to see the GAA pitches dotted all across the country side, Nobber GFC, Kingscourt Stars (Cavan), Syddan GFC, Drunconrath GAA, Meath Hill (Just saw the sign); the strength of the great Meath teams was borne out of these junior and intermediate rural clubs… now a distant memory for Meath folk.
Kingscourt Stars GAA Club .
After reaching the outskirts of Slane I turned towards Navan along the busy main road for a short while but then took a side road that brought me to Broadboyne Bridge and onto the side of the Boyne River for my return into Navan town. Its an historic route with lots of interesting sites, from castles to churches and of course the bradán feasa – the salmon of knowledge, was caught here by the poet Finegas, who had spent many years trying to catch him and gain all his knowledge. The bradán feasa had gained his knowledge by eating nine hazelnuts that had fallen into the Well of Wisdom, this gaining all the knowledge in the world. Finegas left Fionn MacCumhaill to cook it but warned him not to eat any of it until he returned. Fionn was turning the salmon to see if it was cooked and blistered his finger. He immediately put it into his mouth to suck it to ease the pain and he instantly gained all the knowledge! I could do with catching a salmon like that myself!
All in all, the route was 83kms long and I really enjoyed visiting a corner of the country, off the beaten track, that I’m not very familiar with. Fills a void!
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