May 12 - Donegal

Day 4 - Sunday, May 12, 2002

Fanad Head is the big goal for today. The weather is beautiful and warm as we head out. We had decided not to see as much of Inishowen and concentrate on Fanad so we headed west. Oddly, you don't get real clear signs that you are entering or leaving The Republic of Ireland or Northern Ireland. The major indication that a border is nearby is that many establishments except both the £ sterling or the Euro.

We drove around the edge of Letterkenny and up the east side of the Fanad Peninsula along Lough Swilly. The further north we got, the more spectacular the scenery. As you drive, you not only get to enjoy the coast line you are following, but the beautiful coastline of Inishowen across the lough. The road was narrow, but room for two cars. Rarely on this drive are you away from the coast as you pass cliffs and beaches and unobstructed views to the north and east. We stopped at the beach just outside of Portsalon and as we were enjoying the view, a heard of sheep decided to cross the road. Something about it was rather amusing.

We found out way out to Fanad head. By this time the weather had turned a wee bit blustery. The winds were howling, but the sun was, for the most part, still shining. This is one of the most spectacular places in Ireland. The lighthouse is perched on the rocks with the sea surf crashing below it. I took my first spill on the soggy Irish soil as I made my way down to take a picture or two. Then I ventured out on the rocks for a better view and.....DISASTER STRUCK!!!!! While removing a roll of film from the camera, a gust of wind caught me and I stuck my thumb through the thin film shutter on the back side of the camera. This is not a good thing. I was crushed. We still had the digital, but this was my brand new camera and I had doubts about the quality of the pictures on the digital. My mood dropped like a rock off a cliff. We decide to head to Dunfanaghy to our B&B since it was Sunday and a camera shop was not likely to be open. My not so festive mood managed to get us lost on the road we had come in on, but we figured it out eventually.

On the way to Dunfanaghy, we stopped at Doe Castle. Unfortunately for us (but good for the future) Doe was closed for renovations. I still jumped the rock wall and walked around the outside. The setting is very picturesque and we hope to see more of it when we return the next time. Now on to Dunfanaghy.

We easily found "The Corncrakes" B&B down a side road on the far edge of town. The setting is quite nice, especially when the tide is in. We chose a room that looked out on the bay which had a shower, but the toilet was across the hall. It all worked very well. Felicity got a pair of tweezers from the owner (no telling what they are called there) and I set out to repair the camera with absolutely no knowledge of what I was doing. After much gnashing of teeth, I managed to get the back of the camera back into reasonable working order and I went into town to get a cheap roll of 24 exposure film. I started taking pictures of everything I could find to see if I had indeed repaired the camera. I was getting some pretty strange looks because my choice of subjects was not always the most fascinating. The plan was the next day to go to Letterkenny which had the closest One Hour photo shop.

We ate dinner at Arnolds Hotel. It was very good and my first traditional fish and chips of the trip. The Whisky Flu Pub was attached, so we enjoyed a drink and walked around Dunfanaghy. At one point we noticed that a local had apparently been left home without his car (damn wife must have been out shopping), so he drove his tractor to the pub. Man's gotta do what a man's gotta do.

We decide to make the evening drive out to Horn Head. The weather was definitely going downhill at this point, but we made the drive. We would have loved to wander around more but it was cold and very windy so we just enjoyed the view, took a short walk and headed back to town and some much needed rest.

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