Day 63b: Fun Stormin da Castle (BBW30 Lung/Lough Gara Way: Ballaghaderreen-???Sligo???)

So the lunch spot was the BEST, guys. I do not say this lightly as I have had some sweet lunch spots.

But beat this:

Moygara Castle is totally awesome

This it another of the castles that also has been consigned to a grazing ground, but the landowner has set aside a wee parking lot and a human-friendly gate in to the premises. A motorcycle was parked when I arrived – a nice couple over from England was poking around the castle when I got there. The gent apparently originally came from not too far away, and we chatted a bit about the castle and its origins.

Also its awesomeness – this is one of the coolest ruins I have encountered in this entire trip, no joke

Check those rifle slits, the better to shoot you with my dear

It is remarkably intact for a castle apparently dating from the 1500’s

With many a nook and cranny and tree

The main entry, gated off by the farmer (amusingly the far side is unblocked so you can walk right in from over there

A well preserved chimney

Fine prospects to Lough Gara

So that high knob on the right? That would be where I sat to eat lunch

Pretty peerless views from up here

Big ol’ courtyard, ain’t it?

I, uhm, did drop a sock though, with the wind’s help (on the plus side, I got to sincerely and truthfully utter the phrase “oh shit I just dropped my sock off a castle battlement” which how many people ever get to say)

Maurice enjoyed our visit

My sock from the other side for context on the nice height on which I was perching before

The castle herd, lucky ladies

Finally I tore myself away, but wow what a cool spot.

Last lake view for the day

I realized/learned/finally retained today that the R in a road label stands for Regional not Road, and therefore the L in road labels probably means Local not Lane as I had previously imagined

I like the Local roads better I won’t lie

I found this sign adorable but possibly a bit information dense

It was followed by this slightly different version three more times to make sure you got the point

Trees with a view

I ended my day at a random intersection in the middle of rural Sligo, because Andrew Durkin is super nice and willing to drive out to a random point on a map (I literally dropped a marker on Google Maps and texted him the link, this is how obscure my endpoint was). My goal was to make it a reasonable journey to Castlebaldwin for the next day’s walk, because I have a mountain to cross and I didn’t want too much road to cover before that. We’ll see how I did tomorrow…