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Irish Sea Tour

Day 18 – Aberporth to Cilcennin

Aberporth was warm. I’d had a picnic breakfast in the hotel and planned a proper breakfast stop in Llangrannog.Yesterday was the shortest full day of the trip. And it was the hilliest. My legs felt like lead and were about as much use.

Of course there was a big hill out of Aberporth. There was some brief respite as the road dropped towards Penbryn. Then a relentlessly steep hill away from Penbryn. I stopped to lean on a chapel wall to catch my breath and cool down and after some tense negotiation, managed to convince my breakfast not to disembark unceremoniously right there.

As these narrow lanes started to lose height, they turned into a valley and developed a ferny, sub-tropical appearance. Suddenly I emerged on the headland at Llangrannog next to St Carannog’s statue overlooking the bay.

Tuesday it seems, is not a good day to be in Llangrannog. All the cafés are closed on a Tuesday. Coffee was available from the village stores, whose proprietor was busy trying to set up for the day and meet the caffeine needs of half a dozen gathered tourists. This wasn’t the breakfast break I’d planned. It gave me the chance of a longer lunch break in New Quay.

Just the the four 20% hill climbs on the way to New Quay. I stopped briefly at Cwmtydu beach. It was as tranquil as it always is.

New Quay would not have looked out of place on the French Riviera.

I’m done my best to avoid the A487, because I know what the traffic is like on it. After exhausting the back lane options, I sat watching the traffic, or lack of it, for a few minutes before deciding to ride it into Aberaeron. Half a mile down the road the lack of traffic was explained by roadworks. I waited my turn in the long queue, and once through the contraflow, let everyone pass me. I had a lovely traffic-free ride into Aberaeron.

All day, I’d been liaising with Cycle Mart in Cilcennin to see if they could help with my front brake. From Aberaeron, I headed up the cycle track to Llanerchaeron and then pressed out the pedal strokes climbing the final 600ft of the day up to Cilcennin where the brilliant Cycle Mart team welcomed me with coffee and took the brake apart, fixed it, fitted new pads and a new disc all wile I was outside snoozing on the grass in the sunshine. When the bike was ready, I called it a day.

Day totals: 32 miles; 3,978ft of elevation gained

Tour totals: 958 miles, 37,895ft of elevation gained

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