Derrycrag woods

When we woke, it was still pretty wet outside, and I feared we might be stuck indoors again.  But by the time we'd had breakfast it was clearly improving, and my weather forecast app suggested no rain till after 4pm.

So we headed out to a piece of old forest near Lough Derg.  There are, apparently, pine martens and red squirrels here - we found no evidence, sadly!  But we did have a pleasant meander in decent weather.  

As I was photographing this stump, a chap who looked rather similar the Dick Strawbridge walked past, and said his daughter had won a prize in her school photography competition with a photo of this very stump!  

After our walk, we went looking for a cup of tea.  Google Maps located a nearby garden centre, but failed to tell us it was closed today!  After a bit of meandering around, we headed towards Lough Derg.  Google Maps again excelled itself, and directed us to an area with holiday cottages/second homes.  We backtracked again, and eventually made it to Mountshannon.  The extra was taken from the harbour - by this time the weather had deteriorated markedly.

After a brief wander in the very chilly wind, we then continued our quest for sustenance.  We found a rather nice pub, the meals were quite acceptable, but what was particularly nice to see was that there were plenty of customers, many of whom clearly knew each other, seemed to be local, and it wasn't just old fogeys like us, there were several young couples (some with babies).

Afterwards we headed home - it's raining again!