Distance covered: 59km

Hours the plastic bags on my shoes kept the rain out: 3

Number of people on stilts: 2

Number of times I was called an Australian: 4

Lowlight: Coming face-to-face with the four H's of cycling… hills, headwind, heavy rain and hail.

Highlight: Pushing through the four H's for four straight hours.

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Today's cycle was tough. I had a few 'what the hell am I doing' moments as the first hour I only progressed 7km. But I made it and arrived in Killorglin in the pouring rain, naively thinking I'd be able to get a room on the busiest day of the year.

With only 2 hours before the coronation of King Puck I walked from place to place trying to find a bed or even a patch of grass to put up my tent. After a dozen unsuccessful attempts I gave up and decided to watch the parade and the Queen (an 11 year old virgin) and King (a wild goat from Kerry) receive their crowns. The goat wrangler apparently spends weeks tracking down the right goat, capturing him and then he's lifted 3 stories up in the air to the top of a tower to mark the opening of the festival. The poor goat (christened Enda after the Irish prime minister) is left up there for the full three days, rain, hail and no shine. There were photographers from all over the world present, including National Geographic so I'm interested to see what they make of the madness.

Killorglin is the only place on this earth where the goat acts as King and the people act the goat!

The rain was unrelenting and I was still homeless so I left town in search of West's campground, which apparently boasted a tennis court and a pool. It turned out there were many pools, but most people would call them puddles and the tennis court had been downgraded to a ping pong table.  But beggars can't be choosers and after setting up camp I met Dave, a fellow cycle tourist who became my partner in Puck crime for the evening.

Now, speaking of crime I have a confession to make - I've had to resort to petty crime in the last few days to get by on this trip.

No ketchup, mayonaise or salt sachet is safe from my wandering hands. That's right I've become a condiment thief. They are the perfect size for travelling and add a bit of flavour to the most boring of meals. Please try not to judge me, life on the road does weird things to you.

Anyway, I digress, lets get back to the wonderful weirdness of Puck Fair. Once the goat has been lifted the festival is open which basically means everyone goes to the pubs surrounding the town square to drink and sing songs. Dave and I, in the name of research, visited half a dozen of these establishments and I have to say Falveys pour the best pint of Guinness. It was there that I met Mickey and John who had a few jars on them already. When they heard of the decision polls on my website they asked that I put the two of them up as A and B options for my chaperone for the evening. (Not quite the words they used!!) I politely declined and we finished the eve with battered garlic mushrooms, 6 for one euro, what a deal.

Tomorrow I'm going to meet King Puck up close, better wear my best cycle shorts for the honour. Plus I'm hoping to get in on the judging of the bonny baby competition.

It looks like Skelligs Rock is racing into the lead as my next destination and as luck would have it, I had a serendipitous moment this morning where I met the guy who runs the boats out to the island. Interestingly, he was also the first guy to have a surfboard in Europe but that's another story…. Time to go and judge some pikey babies, hope you're having a drier time of it wherever you are.