Wicklow Mountains

The Wicklow mountains lie just 15 miles south of Dublin making it a day trip destination for Ireland's capital city.  The Wicklows offer something for everyone; hiking, archeology, horseback riding, and manor houses with sumptuous gardens to explore...

Glendalough In Wicklow Mnt. Nat. Park

The Wicklow mountains near Dubin have played a significant role in Irish history and have been considered remote until quite recently.   The hills and valleys of County Wicklow provided a handy hiding place for Irish rebels opposing English rule until the English built a military road in 1800 to access the mountains and flush out the Irish resistance.  Today this road is the R-115 that takes you through the Wicklow Mountains, over Sally Gap and drops you into the lush Glendalough Valley at the south end of the mountains.   This area is very popular with Dublin daytrippers, there is a lot to see and do in the area including hiking in the Wicklow Mountains National Park. 
County Wicklow is known as "Garden Country," and there are many elegant country estates here.  While we decided to skip touring the elaborate manor houses and formal gardens in the Wicklow area this trip, there are many worth seeing. The top of the list is  Powerscourt; Irelands most beautiful garden covering 47 acres of a 700-acre estate, Avondale House with it's it's original furniture and 500-acre estate that has fabulous walking trails,  and the Guinness Estate Luggala (hey, it's up for sale if you have €28 million laying around collecting dust).  

*AVONDALE was closed for restorations in August 2018, click the link to their website for updates!

Model Of Monastic Glendalough

Visitor Centre Display

We spent the night in Glendalough staying at HI Hostel so we could have an early morning of exploring the ruins of one of Ireland's most extensive early Celtic Christian monastic settlements.  After breakfast at the hostel, we went back to the Glendalough site to check out the visitor centre.  The Glendalough Visitor Centre  9:30-6pm daily has plenty of parking (€4) and costs €5 entrance fee unless you have your OPW Heritage Card.  There are many displays at the center including a model of what the monastic city looked like, a display on Ireland's unique round towers, historical artifacts from the Glendalough site and a 20-minute film on Christian monasteries in Ireland.  You can also take the 45-minute Glendalough guided tour offered once a day, check for tour times on the Visitor Center website.

Walking The Labyrinth Of Glendalough

After exploring the Visitor Center and the ruins of the ancient monastery at Glendalough we decided to take a walk to the lakes.  Glendalough means "valley of the two lakes" in Irish, and there are two beautiful lakes nestled between the mountain valleys within an easy walk of the Visitor Centre.  

Walking the trails of Glendalough

Walking in Wicklow Mountains National Park is a big tourist attraction.  The park is free for all to enter and you can download a walking guide to many of Glendalough's walking trails HERE.  Most of the walks are 1-3 km, but some more robust rambles are 9-11 km in length; a good day hike for most.
Many of the people that stayed in our hostel in Glendalough were walking the WICKLOW WAY a 131 km system of trails that begin in the Dublin suburb of Rathfarnham and end in the village of Clonegal in County Carlow at the southern end of the Wicklow Mountains.  It usually takes about 7-10 days for most folks to complete The Wicklow Way, and the scenery is stunning.

There is also a 30km walk called ST. KEVIN'S WAY that is a modern pilgrim route that follows the path St. Kevin took from Hollywood over the Wicklow Mountains to Glendalough.
We decided to ramble a bit and walked the GREEN ROAD WALK to Glendalough Upper Lake, a leisurely 1 hour 3km stroll.  Part of the Green Road Walk is through grassy wetlands, and the trail follows a beautiful boardwalk that eventually leads you through lush Oak forests to the Upper Lake.  There are more ruins of the ancient monastic settlement of Glendalough set in a grassy field near the shores of Upper Lake, including a high cross and ruins of a stone church.   This was such a picturesque spot to rest, dip your feet in the lake and perhaps have a picnic.   

 Upper Lake Glendalough, Wicklow Mountains

The Wicklow Gap

My Precious Gin

Wicklow Gold

The sun was climbing high in the sky, and we couldn't linger in this enchanting valley any longer.  We decided to follow the path of St. Kevin west towards Hollywood by driving over the famous Wicklow Gap.  The term "gap" is actually a mountain pass, and once at the top of the Wicklow Gap, you can see down into the Glendalough Valley below.  The Wicklow Mountains are covered in juniper bushes, heather and other fragrant botanicals; as are most of the mountains in Southern Ireland, which is why there is a lot of gin being produced in Ireland today.   My absolute favourite gin is made in the Wicklow Mountains by Glendalough Distillery.  Their gin is made in small batches (less than 250 litres) with hand-picked plants and botanicals foraged from the mountains around Glendalough.  In fact, Glendalough Distillery is the only distillery in Ireland that has a full-time forager on staff year round.  I purchased a bottle of their "Wild Botanical" gin. It was truly an exceptional gin and tasted like the clean herbal taste of mountain meadows with a hint of sweet floral!  Glendalough makes four season varietal gins and also a "ginteresting" series with such exciting gins such as seaweed, beech leaf and mountain heather & wild blackberry gin-YUM!  So many choices...

Wicklow Gap

I like to always bring home one bottle of local alcohol as a souvenir from my travels, so I brought home a bottle of the "Wild Botanical" gin. My only regret is that I didn't get more!  Just sniffing the bottle of gin is like mentally rolling around in the wild heather & juniper plants of the Wicklow Mountains!  
The Wicklow Mountains and it's National Park are a playground for all ages to enjoy, whether you are touring gardens or walking the trails as the pilgrims of ancient Ireland did.  With so much to see and do in the Wicklows, you could easily spend a week or more just in this region of Ireland alone.

"DUL GO MALL" which is Irish for Go Slowly 🐌 

Do you like to hike, walk or "ramble" when you go travelling?  If so, what has your favourite walk been?  Tell me in the comments below...

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