Dublin to Newry by Train and Bike

June 17, 2025

Rarely do things work according to plan and we need to celebrate when they do. Today was such a day. We had a 10:50 train booked from Dublin Connolly Station to Dundalk station and then a 32 km ride from Dundalk to Newry, Northern Ireland.

Having learned our lesson yesterday at the Ariel House, we popped down for breakfast shortly after 8 am, a very early start for us. It was crowded even then but we enjoyed a mushroom bruschetta (Jill) and a salmon dish and granola compote (Dave). Yes, Irish cuisine has come a long way since I was there last time (25 years ago). Fyi: I would definitely recommend Ariel House for cyclists coming to Dublin. We had a hard time finding a place to stay with bikes and Ariel House worked well and is in a good neighborhood.

We were taking a very short train ride (one hour) to Dundalk and then doing a short afternoon bike ride. We hadn’t had a chance to scope out Connolly Station (status of lifts, elevators, platforms, etc) but last night at dinner our host David and his guest Joe, had given us a bit of a scoop on Connolly Station logistics, which helped. The Intercity train we were on left from the upper platform so Dave had to maneuver both bicycles up the escalator, having determined that was easier than using the small lift. (It’s on my list to learn how to get my bike up an escalator and in a lift - but not today!) After that it was a breeze. The train was already at the track and although they were not ready to load, when the train staffer saw us with our bikes she said we could load early and she led us to the train and helped load our bikes up into the special train car. We had assigned seats in second class but she let us sit in first class in order to be near our bikes. When we unloaded an hour later she made sure she was right there and that we had bikes and gear off before the train continued. It was an overwhelmingly positive experience. Thank you Irish Rail. A really great part of cycle touring in Ireland is how nice and thoughtful Irish people are.

Those panniers really want to pull me and the bike back down the escalator, requiring me to make sure the brakes are firmly set. (Do you pronounce panniers in the French manner, "pan-yās? Or do you prefer the English version, "pan-years"?)

Also on the train ride we met Alan, another Irish cyclist who joined us in First Class, after helping Dave hang our bikes up on the designated hooks. He is married to an American woman from Chicago and had two adult kids living in Colorado, so of course we had a spirited conversation and laughed about what a small world it was. He was on his way to a conference. He ran a small Christian charity that provided financial education to churches, basically a train-the-trainer approach that allows churches to help their communities. We had a fun talk about how that came to be and his unexpected bible school education in Chicago. The hour talking to Alan passed quickly and we were startled when the announcer reported Dundalk station was ahead. True to her word, the train staffer helped us with our bikes and we disembarked.

Having been built in 1849, the Dundalk train station is historical. The full name of the station is Dundalk Clarke, named in honor of Irish nationalist Thomas Clarke, who was executed by the British after the 1916 Easter Rising, an unsuccessful armed rebellion by Irish nationalists that proved pivotal in the creation of an Irish Free State. I learned, when looking up train station naming protocols in Ireland, that many of the stations are named after Irish rebels executed by the Brits after the 1916 Easter Rising. Dublin Connolly is named after John Connolly (Irish socialist and nationalist, executed by the British) and Dublin Heuston is named after Seán Heuston (same drill: participated in Easter Rising and executed by the Brits). At Dundalk Clarke there is a small museum showing photos and other paraphernalia memorializing the station’s existence. The station had a ramp so we could roll our bikes up rather than deal with the lift or the stairs. (I vote for more train stations installing ramps).

Ramps! They are a godsend for cyclists and, one would assume, wheel chair bound passengers.

We had a mellow ride out of Dundalk. There wasn't much traffic and we hit the rural countryside pretty quickly. We were riding through the Ring of Gullion and Sleive Gullion Forest Park, the Ring of Gullion being an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB). AONB’s are lands protected for conservation by a British law passed in 2000. (Most well-known nature reserves in Britain are AONBs and I looked out for them when I planned our route). The Ring of Gullion area has evidence of early Neolithic man and was a border area during the Iron Age (500 BC to 400 AD).

The Carrive Forest is inside the Ring of Gullion.

Thanks to the pleasant weather, we were able to enjoy the lovely countryside.

The ride was varied enough to be interesting; we passed into Northern Ireland at some point and saw a lot of flags for Armagh - the Northern Irish County we are now in.

In the village of Mullaghbrawn we stopped for a mint ice cream bar which we consumed sitting on the steps of the Spar.

Me enjoying a shared lunch of an ice cream bar and bag of chips, excuse me, bag of crisps. As I quickly learned, in this part of the world potato chips are called crisps. Chips are French fries.

I had planned a slight deviation to see the Ballykeel Dolmen - which is two upright stones supporting a third horizontal slab, believed to be a 5,000 year old tomb. At the dolmen two ladies were sitting underneath it and we said hello but didn’t strike up a conversation because we felt like we were intruding in a spiritual place. When we left they started playing their drums. People are all so different.

About 15 km from our destination of Newry we wound up on a busy road for about 7 km. It was a shock because the entire ride beforehand had been quiet. We were able to peel off the main road by diverting onto a smaller road up a hill. As we turned off the main road a motorist stopped us to see if we were lost. She thought we should stay on the main road as that was a more direct route to Newry. I had to explain to this very nice and concerned woman that we were trying to avoid busy roads. Obviously she wasn’t a cyclist.

The ride into Newry was up and down some very stiff, short climbs but we rolled into Newry right at 3 pm. Newry is a small city of about 27,000 and although it is predominantly Irish Catholic, it wound up in Northern Ireland. There is an attractive canal that runs right through town, constructed between 1732 and 1743, built to link the local Tyrone coalfields to the Irish Sea. The town thus became a transportation hub for the region until the canal was closed for navigation in 1947. We were staying at the Canal Court Hotel so we were right on the canal and had a good view of it out our window.

The hotel is a big old historical place with lots of large high-ceilinged rooms. Oddly and even though it was a Wednesday afternoon, there was a wedding going on and throughout the afternoon and evening we saw various wedding participants and heard a lot of bad wedding dance music. The next morning at breakfast many wedding guests appeared in the dining room, looking a bit worse for wear.

Main entrance to the stately Canal Court hotel.

The hotel had a “leisure complex” so we took advantage of that and did a short workout.

That evening we had dinner at Guru Indian restaurant. It was Tuesday, so the first three restaurants I had noted in my research notes were closed. I am not really an Indian food fan but we had talked about the British Isles being a good place to eat Indian food. I can't tell you what we had - knowing nothing about Indian cuisine - but it was delicious. I'm rethinking my prejudice against Indian food.

We sat in the nice old fancy bar in the hotel and I worked on the journal and Dave drank his first Bushmill’s, the famed Northern Irish whisky. He has four more days to drink Irish whisky and then we are onto Scotland, so he has his work cut out for him.

Today's ride: 38 km (24 miles)
Total: 1,620 km (1,006 miles)

Rate this entry's writing	Heart	3
Comment on this entry	Comment	0