The Wild Atlantic Way in Ireland is a driving route between 180 scenic locations on the western coast of Ireland. But can it also be cycled? The answer is definitely yes and this video which includes a wide variety of route suggestions is based off my experience of doing so by ebike – theres a lot of ascent as you follow the rugged Irish coastline of the WAW so even a modest battery assist helps a lot but of course if you have the added fitness these routes and hints apply equally to the powered by only pushing pedals community.
Links to the maps of suggested routes in video
Signature points only 1757km , 17600m ascent – https://cycle.travel/map/journey/515796
Sig points plus short detours 1781km, 18000m ascent – https://cycle.travel/map/journey/515801
All the WaW stops 3075, 27,400m ascent – https://cycle.travel/map/journey/515093
Miss nothing 3635km, 35,300m ascent https://cycle.travel/map/journey/509924
After you’ve watched this video be sure to continue to my playlist of day by day vlogs from cycling the WAW https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRcr37Lk8e4WngHyQjlVeeWM8bGN_38Q6
So the wild Atlantic way is a driving route running along the Atlantic coast of Ireland uh from canale which isn’t really on the Atlantic coast all the way to muff in dunal uh it’s about 2 and a half th000 kilm of driving um and it’s got somewhere between 170 and 180 of
These stops with the uh rusted effect signposts you’re seeing here uh nearly all on the coastline itself um it’s somewhere between 170 and 180 uh that’s actually because different numbers are even given on the official website and I’ll give you a look at that in a moment
Um and the question is can you cycle it the answer to that is definitely yes however uh cycling the route itself as you’ll find on the website probably isn’t to be recommended because it’s route designed for uh people in cars to get from 1.2 to another uh relatively
Fast and uh uh in a way that doesn’t create excess traffic and that’s not really the sort of thing you want to be on if you’re cycling some of the time uh in particular where it’s following what are called national roads and Ireland they have the letter N designating them
Uh they tend to be very busy and often uh in rural areas there won’t be any hard shoulder and there certainly won’t be any cycle Lane um now Euro one follows or Parallels the route uh for quite a long way um although it goes Inland a lot more so that would be one
Option uh but what I’m going to do in this video is instead show you uh a couple of options I’ve designed uh which keep you away from those main roads and either there’s a short option which just get you to the major dis Discovery points or a much longer one that goes to
Everything of interest that much longer one ends up being about 32,000 km in length and your doing 38,000 M of a scent as you go along it um sometimes people think if you cycle coastlines they’re going to be fairly flat that might be the case in some other
Countries it’s definitely not the case in Ireland there’s an awful lot of hills on the coastline uh okay you’re not going over some of the highest points in the country but in fact they’re following this route uh the highest point is the sleevely cliffs which are
598 M so if you’re cycling to 598 m from sea level that’s a fair Ascent but anyway let’s have a look at the different options so I’m basing uh my descriptions of these roots on my own experience of cycling most of them I did this via eike
You’ll see my bike in a lot of the photographs uh and I largely camped I largely wild camped in fact it’s easy enough to find spots where you will get away with wild camping uh although wild camping in Ireland normally isn’t legal it’s it’s just got a very kind of
Complicated uh setup basically but most of the time you won’t be bothered if you’re camping Dusk to Dawn um and I mostly uh manag to charge my batteries uh in pubs or in restaurants while I was uh eating or drinking um so that’s that’s definitely possible you know if
You’re kind of coming here and you’re going is this possible to do by ebike yes no problem at all and in fact I I think ebikes uh it’s probably a very strong recommendation for them particularly if you’re not some kind of like a clad amazing level of Fitness
Person uh just because there are so many Hills on this rout there’s so many ups there’s so many downs and in fact the routs I’m suggesting which are keeping you off the main roads the disadvantage of staying off the main roads is the main roads at least are really flat well
Sorry not really flat they’re comparatively flat uh whereas once you hit the side roads they really do go up and down every every single Valley now that also means they’re going to be very much more beautiful uh most of the pictures you’re seeing here are actually
On the route itself that’s the route I’m actually suggesting um so you’ll get a quick idea of just what you’re liable to expect H and there’s also very many really stunning uh Discovery points that are worth stopping for and I’m also going to talk about some things that
Aren’t Discovery points on the wild Atlantic wave but I think you should definitely go to uh short detours of like 3 4 5 km particularly some of the stone circles for instance that aren’t on it are very worth visiting um so anyway not all of these are the wild Atlantic way these
Ones you’re looking at now are actually the East Coast uh but you can find my complete set of Irish Coast Cycles I’m cycling the entire Coastline I have 40 day-to-day videos up at the moment uh on the playlist uh that I created for that purpose but anyway let’s go on to look
At the specifics of the route so this is the official uh root map which which you will find on the Discover Ireland website uh the route was launched in 2014 uh and it’s been a kind of stunning example of tourist branding success I think it’s probably the name itself is
Quite evocative uh but actually it kind of does make sense I mean it does take you through some of the most fantastic uh rural scenery in Ireland and there’s a lot of actually very pretty towns on the route as well uh a couple have been you know probably suffer a bit from too
Much tourism Kalani in particular which is actually off Ro uh but you know basically you’re going to enjoy doing it so the way the official route works is they have I think 15 key signature points which are these round circles on the map and then uh the line
Between them is the road rout that connects them up now the road rout uh is indicated by signage which is basically a blue rectangle with the little wavy line through it um and I’ll show you one of those here in a moment but if we zoom
In on this this map uh right so you can see that there’s nothing here between these two signature points but when you click on one of them it then fills in uh all the other PL all the other points where I think they have signposts right
So this essentially is a map of where there are those rust effect signposts um and of the road that leads to those sign posts and again it’s taking a road that’s the most convenient route for cars in some cases that’s not the best route at all for cyclists in fact often enough
It’s the worst uh so this map is a good way of getting your bearings some people do actually cycle that route uh and to be honest if you’re cycling a road bike with very thin Wheels then there might be a case for doing it that way because
At least most of the wild Atlantic roads themselves are have a good surface on them because they’re part of the tourism industry uh whereas the road the routs I going you suggest which take you down rural roads and local roads uh those roads maybe got surface 10 or 15 years
Ago and have suffered from weather and vehicles ever since they can be quite rough they often have grass growing down the middle I mean the absolute favorites are um are the ones with those grass going down the middle H and you know if you’re on a bike that’s got relatively
Delicate wheels that might prove a little bit too much both in terms of punctures and potentially buckles um but if you on any sort of touring bike at all uh then they’re absolutely gorgeous and many of these roads that you’ll meet almost no traffic whatsoever um a lot of
The time the only traffic you’ll run into is the occasional bit of agricultural Machinery uh which can be a bit alarming because these things are huge but you’ll hear them long before you even see them uh and then just locals you know doing the run back and
Forth to the shops there’s some points on the route where you can’t avoid the main roads uh and that’s basically some of the peninsulas uh particularly the Dingle peninsul SL up here um and that’s because the there’s basically mountains running down the center of this and there’s only one road going down this
Way uh so you’re absolutely stuck on the main road for a stretch of this but I will when we get there show you uh the by road you can take that at least manage to skip the worst of that uh so yeah that’s the route um if we scroll
Quickly up through it you’re getting an idea of it here and as you’ll see it also goes out to a lot of the islands now I have included the islands in my route uh those fairies going to the ones they rooted to on those fairies you can
Take a bike um and I think the island culture is probably something not to be missed however it does take a chunk of extra time because you obviously have to wait till there’s a ferry leaving same coming back there’s the time spent on the ferry so if you wanted to do a
Quicker version of any of these or if you know you’re on a schedule you’re a couple of days behind and you want to make just then you can simply start skipping the islands as the easy way out so I’m going to be using the cycle. trvel website uh to show you the roots
But also because you’re going to be able to uh download a GPX file from that website H or indeed run it on a smartphone when you’re doing the rout and it will G it will give you uh basic directions uh cycle. travel I started using when I started using cycle in
Basically because it has a very very good free option uh that gives you most of the things uh well it gives you everything you need in order to do it uh after I’d used it for a few months I upgraded to what the paid tier that basically gives you additional maps and
Stuff uh and the additional Maps can be lucky uh sorry can be handy if you’re looking for wild camping spots but you can absolutely use it successfully without paying anything so uh I you know I actually do think it’s it’s one of those things that’s worth paying for um
But uh you don’t need to to make that decision yet uh so it’s just cycle. travel and the app is also called cycle. travel uh so here we can see the route I have mapped out now this route is uh the discovery points route so that’s the 15
Or so key Discovery points and this route is really for somebody who wants to say they’ve done the wild Atlantic way H but doesn’t have much time uh it’s about 1,700 kilm and you could probably do that reasonably in 3 weeks and if you’re very fit you could probably
Shorten that uh to two um so going in on it uh again it started canil so one of the key differences between this and the other routs I’d show you is this does large Inland segments because it’s only going between those Discovery routes uh so the other good thing about cycle.
Travel is it’s default is to root you along quiet back roads it’s really very good at doing that um so uh if it’s doing this sort of Inland Loop that probably makes the most sense um and it on the prin itself it’s it’s mostly because I’m very familiar with
These it’s managed to find back roads to get you down to the tips of them rather than sending you down the main road uh which is where the wild Atlantic way would send you uh there’s bits of this you could modify by going uh using Euro
Instead but you will add quite a bit to the actual length uh so this is the for people that are impatient now I did modify it uh which is because I have cycled this uh I’m aware that there are points on this route where really with very very small diversions you’re going
To come across quite stunning uh things that are worth seeing um and that’s particularly uh org Stone Circle for instance which I have this diversion here it’s about I think it’s about three or 4 km and there’s a beautiful Lake followed by the Stone Circle it’s well
Worth taking that little trip off it or the other thing is uh down here for instance uh where the default would be to root you in and out on this road but actually does this Loop here which only adds a couple of kilometers again uh but send you down a piece of spectacular
Coastline so I think I added about five or six different points uh along the root uh and you’ll spot those because they’re a number so whenever there’s a number either there’s something at the number so the discovery points there’s something I’ve added or I I’ve put the
Number in there to drag the route along that particular way out and often that’s to stop you going in in one road and then coming out the same road again which would be kind of dull uh but I’m aware that there’s a a a nearby road that you can use instead that’s probably
Very beautiful uh and that doesn’t really add anything to your distance if you’re curious the the amount of distance that actually added for the entire 1750 kilm uh for me adding this in additional points is about 31 km so it’s not very much if you’re in a hurry
You want to do it quickly then this is the route to take uh I’m not sure that’s really in the spirit of the wild Atlantic way but not everybody has the time to spend what would be six weeks realistically uh to complete the whole rout now of course you don’t need to do
It in a single go you could come back and do it over a couple of years or whatever uh but I’ll understand if you need to take the short fast route so this next route is uh all the official stops so as I said depending on
Which version you of the website you go with that’s somewhere between 170 and 180 stops I think I’ve got the 180 uh in here um and uh this is about 3,075 km and involves about let me see here uh 2,700 M of climbing so that’s an ambitious cycle you know you’re you’re
Really talking four to five weeks even doing it quite fast six weeks allowing for the weather uh and it goes out to all the islands as well um so as we zoom in you’ll immediately see it’s going much closer to the coast consistently then that other route uh which was going
Inland for this particular section and there’s bits of the coast that it gets extremely noodly and that’s because of the structure of the Irish Coastline on the Atlantic side is lots and lots of often quite long inlets and uh these are often quite mountainous as well uh so
You very often end up going to a road that runs most of the way down and then at the end of that road if there’s multiple Discovery points you’ll have five kilm This Way 3 km that way 8 km that way to visit each of them the other
Thing to be aware of is because these are often up quite mountainous locations that often means you’re going to be going up quite High down to sea level to reach a point back up to quite a high point down to sea level to each another Point uh so keep that in mind when
You’re thinking about your daily distances however don’t be discouraged by that because if you’re doing this cycle not so much for the uh the destination but the journey all of these places are really worth visiting and in fact so too are the roads connecting them for the most part
There’s very very little cycling that could be described as boring uh along these routs whatsoever maybe a little bit coming out of East cork uh but even there not really um so anyway you have you can see all the numbers here on it you have about 180 stops and on this one
Uh unlike the previous one it’s going down the bottom of all the peninsulas uh sheep’s head peninsula here for instance isn’t on the signature route at all uh it it’s just get skipped over but here you’re going right down um people often ask me which my favorite
Part I’ve cycled is and the answer is you can’t really say that uh all of these uh peninsulas in particular in the southwest are all spectacular and often in quite different ways in fact as you go from north to south uh the northern one is the most rugged that’s the
Peninsula dingler is on and then down here kind of mizen head H is probably the one that is still pretty rugged but uh is is is is more lower line on average climate wise this is also kind of the warmest but often also the wetest
Bit of the country uh as you go more onto the Atlantic coast itself and as you head north it’s going to be wetter and colder um so that’s one thing to keep in mind if you’re ending to the entire trip in a single go which would
Be about six weeks of cycling uh then the best month wants to be doing that are probably May and June or uh September and October maybe a little bit going into July and a little bit going into August at either of those that way you’re missing most of the tourist
Traffic uh that will make finding accommodation easier mean you have less likely to hassle while camping it should generally be fairly easy to walk into places and get a meal uh although at the extremes that a lot of places won’t have opened yet so do keep that in mind but
Anyway if you’re doing it early in the year I would start at the South and head north North so you’re getting the milder weather here and as the summer arrives although the Irish summer pretty random uh you’re heading north so it doesn’t matter so much that it gets colder or if
You’re doing it late then start at the North and head south uh for the same reason uh people often go well which way is the prevailing wind going uh and what I what I say to them is if you actually look at the root that kind of doesn’t
Really matter because every day you’re going north you’re going south you’re going east you’re going west West and even within any of these you’re going north south east and west every few kilometers so I wouldn’t worry too much about prevailing winds the Atlantic coast the weather is not really
Predictable it can be going one way in the morning the opposite way in the evening H it wouldn’t be my main consideration in terms of planning H A lot of the time of course this well all the time the Sun is going to be setting in the East so that might affect your
Decision making in terms of trying to avoid cycling into the Sun or not but uh again there’s too many zigzags for that to make a huge difference so anyway this is the route that goes to every single uh of the discovery signposts as I said
Um there are a lot of them there are a lot of loops on the RO you’re going to be covering a lot of ground but in my opinion it’s not quite enough and so the next one I’m going to show you adds a little bit more to
That so we might call this option my Miss nothing route uh actually go to Ireland you’re going to miss the there’s just too much to see but at least for the Atlantic Coastline this means you’ll probably get to just about everything you could possibly want to get to it is
3,650 KM so about 600 km faster oh sorry longer than that previous route uh but the more scary statistic might be that it’s 35,000 M of climbing which is another 7,000 M of ascent basically along the Route um so what this is Route does is there are a lot of spots on the
Wild Atlantic way route or near the wild Atlantic way route that the wild Atlantic way doesn’t have a sign poost for yet who knows in some cases they may have in future but I think in a lot of cases that’s because these are spots where the roads down to them are
Particularly bad uh and often where there’s no parking potential at the end of the road of whatever the the thing you’re going to look at this includes some of the stone circles uh and and smaller castles and um so I think they’ve made the decision that there’s no point signposting cars to these
Particular spots because if they send a car down you know a long load that’s only single track there’s no parking at the end of it uh then they’re obviously just going to be causing hassle both for the tourists trying to visit that spot uh and of course for the locals who will
Not be too pleased by having lots of traffic on the road uh however great thing about cycle touring is you’re not taking up space in anything like the same way uh you don’t really need any space to park at anywhere you can just lean the bike up against a wall or
Whatever uh and also you have the potential to stop in other spots where cars would just not be able to so this route includes all those wild Atlantic way uh signposts that are in the previous map but also adds I think about 30 places that I’m aware of from doing
My uh Coast Cycles that I think are really worth visiting uh um uh and are really good additions uh and that includes uh just to pick a single example out for instance is when you’re on the Dingle Peninsula uh I think it’s probably well worth uh doing the climb
On Mount Bandon uh that goes to the pattern Noster Lakes uh and there’s a little car park here that you can uh get to that from um so yeah there’s multiple uh additional things I have added I haven’t added every everything that’s in my my if you watch the 40 day today
Cycling Diaries covering the entire Coast there’s additional things I I haven’t put in there like one thing that interests me personally is you uh come across a lot of monuments on the uh on some of these routs to Irish Republicans killed particularly in the war of independence in the 1920s but also going
Back as far as 1798 I think those are quite interesting but actually if you’re following this my route you’re going to be passing those anyway so there are things you come across on the route that you may find of interest uh that are just simply uh not marked as a point so
Don’t be afraid to stop otherwise uh so yeah that is the additional one and I’m going to show you at this point one other cool feature of cycle do travel which is if you click on the Little Mountain icon here it’ll show you where your where the hills are and then you
Can hover on one of these and click on it and it’ll bring you to that bit of the map so here’s the highest point of the entire route which is up by the sleeve League Cliffs basically uh and uh you can sort of spot where the climbing
Is going to come from if you do a day if you do copy the map and then do a day-to-day breakdown obviously you get that in a lot more detail but it can be kind of Handy to know what’s coming up uh as you’re going around so anyway
These are the maps for the wild Atlantic way cycle as I said completely possible to do it it is ambitious I think it’s particularly suitable for ebikes because you’re really going to appreciate that battery at the end of the day or on one of those days where you know you’re
Coming to a high Central Point and then repeatedly descending to the coast and coming back to that High Point uh to visit multiple spots um I have done all this mostly camping uh mostly wild camping I kind of stay in bnbs to get a a shower every few nights basically um
And just have a break and sometimes to C up on sleep uh but I found the whole experience of doing it absolutely fantastic I think lots more people should cycle it and one of the things I like about ebikes and why I bought one myself is it opens up the potential for
Doing that kind of longdistance cycle touring to a lot more people who might otherwise just feel they went uh particularly up for the distances but uh anyway I hope you do it uh if you do maybe post a comment on the video to let me uh know and you’ll find the links to
All these maps in the description uh that I’ll include underneath uh the video here so you’ll be able to clink directly through to um the cycle travel one uh great website totally recommended as I said you can put the app on your phone and then uh use the directions as
You go along and of course you can also modify my maps creating your own ones out of it if you want to add additional points of interest I hope that’s encouraged you to attempt you wild Atlantic way do give the video a like if you found it useful
And do give the channel a follow to catch future updates from me
1 Comment
Hi amazing well done . Thanks for sharing this brilliant info.sorry what make ebike did u use thanks.