Day 96: The crowd

Day 96 - Sunday, July 8th 2018: Spiddal to Galway 20 km / Total 1982 km, 19°C, cloudy

Rain. A soft one, but rain. Enough to pack my tent wet. But not enough to get the grass green again. It was short, in the early morning. And when I started my walk at 11 am (come on, it's Sunday, even for me) it was still cloudy, but warm and heavy.

What a trafic in Spiddal! Bad timing: it was the end of the Mass, everybody was getting out. 

It was not only that, but there was also traffic all along the road, quite busy. There's a big city definitely close. 

So, as there was a footpath, I was safe on the road and chose to listen to music to avoid cars' noise: Doogie Maclean, Doolin (French band from Toulouse playing Irish music that Florence recommended me), etc. It gave me the pace to walk and made me forget about the walk and my painful feet. 

I stopped at the first restaurant to get some food and it was full. Was it because of the weather, Sunday, holidays, or the big city so close? In Barna, I met my first fire crossing since ... maybe Westport 3 weeks ago? I almost forgot such a thing exists. 

Then I followed the Wild Atlantic Way to Salthill. The beach, the seaside walk, the road, full of people, a lot of traffic. So many people. I was really not used to it anymore. And as I entered Galway, I had to walk into one of its busiest streets in the Latin Quarter and I wondered if I would be able to cross the crowd with my big bag. Too many people, too much noise, hard to pay attention to something else than my way to the hostel. I think the last time I saw so many people was on St Patrick's Day in Dublin. Even in Belfast, the streets weren't so busy. I think it was quite a shock after so many days alone on the road, in the middle of nowhere.