The Healy Pass is one of those roads that looks impossible on a map and merely improbable once you are on it. It crosses the spine of the Beara peninsula at about three hundred and thirty metres, cutting through the Caha mountains from Cork into Kerry, and the road zigzags up the southern side in tight hairpins before sweeping across the pass and descending the other side with views of Bantry Bay on one side and the Kenmare River on the other. The county border runs along the top.
The road was built in the 1840s as a famine relief scheme, to give work to starving local people in return for a wage, and many of the men who built it did so on little food. It was later improved and named after Tim Healy, a nationalist politician from Bantry who became the first Governor-General of the Irish Free State. It is a poignant history for a road that is now a source of pleasure, and the stone walls that line its edges are the work of those men.
The riding is excellent but demanding. The hairpins are tight and steep, with a rough surface in places and little protection at the edge, and the road is narrow, with passing places that are needed when you meet a coach or a campervan. Sheep wander freely, and the weather can change in minutes, with cloud and rain sweeping across the pass. Fog can reduce visibility to a few metres, so use your lights and take care.
Nature is wild. The mountains are covered with heather, bog and rock, with waterfalls running down the slopes after rain, and the sea is visible in both directions. Red deer roam the hills, and ravens and choughs fly over the cliffs. The air is cool and damp and smells of peat and bog myrtle.
There are no facilities at the pass, and the nearest services are in Adrigole to the south, and Lauragh to the north, with Kenmare and Bantry as the larger towns on either side. Take it slowly, stop at the top for the view, and respect the history of the road.