Laragh, Co. Wicklow (2019-09-21)

Laragh is just up the road from the 12th century monastic ruins at Glendalough, the Wicklow Mountains National Park, and the long distance Wicklow Way walking path, which is what attracted us to the area.  The bonus for today is that my cousins Mary and Nora are driving down from Tipperary to have lunch with us.

We only had a couple of hours after breakfast to explore, so with directions from Clare, our B&B host, we walked over the Derrybawn bridge (built around 1700) onto the Green Road (non-public road through the woods) which took us up the valley to the Glendalough Visitors Centre, where I parted with 50 cents to get a copy of the map of the walking trails in the area.  There is no shortage of trails and we will have no trouble filling our 3 days here.

Derrybawn Bridge

Marlene on The Green Road

Armed with the map, we walked around the monastic site ruins, and then back along the Green Road to our B&B, with a short stop at a Woollen Mills outlet store.

Round Tower - Glendalough

We were not back at the B&B for more than 15 minutes when Mary and Nora arrived, so back we went to Wicklow Heather for another great meal, and more conversation than we have had in the past week.  But all too soon it was time for the cousins to head home, so we said our goodbyes and with one eye on the weather, set off on another walk.

Us with my Irish Cousins

This time we followed the orange loop path in a clockwise direction, which meant 700 ft. of elevation gain at the beginning of the walk, with a return on the Green Road.  The path took us along a ridge higher up the valley wall, so we had good views of the ruins and the upper lake from the path, while walking mainly in woods....very different from Anglesey.

Upper Lake - Glendalough

Light rain started when we were about to descend to the upper lake, but we did not get completely soaked, although it rained steadily for the balance of our walk.  On the way down we passed the Poulanass Waterfall, before rejoining the Green Road for the return to the B&B.

Poulanass Waterfall

We finished the day having walked almost 19 km with over 1000 ft. of elevation gain, so not too bad on a day that was intended mainly for visiting.