Ireland (Lonely Planet, 9th Edition) - Fionn Davenport [125]
EATING
Laragh’s the place for a bit of grub, as there’s only one sit-down spot in Glendalough.
During summer, villagers put out signs and serve tea and scones on the village green.
Glendalough Hotel ( 0404-45135; bar mains around €10, 3-course lunch €21; noon-6pm) The hotel’s enormous restaurant serves a very good lunch of unsurprising dishes, usually involving some chicken, beef and fish. The bar menu – burgers, sandwiches, sausages and the like – is also quite filling.
Wicklow Heather Restaurant ( 0404-45157; www.thewicklowheather.com; Main St, Laragh; mains €16-26; noon-8.30pm) This is the best place for anything substantial. The menu offers Wicklow lamb, wild venison, Irish beef and fresh fish (the trout is excellent) – most of it sourced locally and all of it traceable from farm to fork.
GETTING THERE & AWAY
St Kevin’s Bus ( 0404-481 8119; www.glendaloughbus.com) departs from outside the Mansion House on Dawson St in Dublin at 11.30am and 6pm Monday to Saturday, and 11.30am and 7pm Sunday (one way/return €13/20, 1½ hours). It also stops at the Town Hall in Bray. Departures from Glendalough are at 7.15am and 4.30pm Monday to Saturday. During the week in July and August the later bus runs at 5.30pm, and there is an additional service at 9.45am.
Glenmalure
As you go deeper into the mountains southwest of Glendalough near the southern end of the Military Rd, everything gets a bit wilder and more remote. Beneath the western slopes of Wicklow’s highest peak, Lugnaquilla, is Glenmalure, a dark and sombre blind valley flanked by scree slopes of loose boulders. After coming over the mountains into Glenmalure you turn northwest at the Drumgoff bridge. From there it’s about 6km up the road beside the River Avonbeg to a car park where trails lead off in various directions.
Glenmalure figures prominently in the national tale of resistance against the British. The valley was a clan stronghold, and in 1580 the redoubtable chieftain Fiach Mac Hugh O’Byrne (1544–97) and his band of merry men actually managed to defeat an army of 1000 English soldiers; the battle cost the lives of 800 men and drove Queen Elizabeth into an apoplectic rage. In 1597 the English avenged the disaster when they captured O’Byrne and impaled his head on the gates of Dublin Castle.
SIGHTS & ACTIVITIES
Near Drumgoff is Dwyer’s or Cullen’s Rock, which commemorates both the Glenmalure battle and Michael Dwyer, a member of the United Irishmen who fought unsuccessfully against the English in the Rising of 1798 (see also Click here) and holed up here. Men were hanged from the rock during the Rising.
You can walk up Lugnaquilla Mountain or head up the blind Fraughan Rock Glen east of the car park. Alternatively, you can go straight up Glenmalure Valley passing the small, seasonal An Óige Glenmalure Hostel, after which the trail divides – heading northeast, the trail takes you over the hills to Glendalough, while going northwest brings you into the Glen of Imaal.
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TOP FIVE EATS IN WICKLOW
Campo de Fiori Click here
Ballyknocken House Click here
Tinakilly Country House & Restaurant Click here
Grangecon Café (opposite)
Organic Life/Marc Michel Click here
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The head of Glenmalure and parts of the neighbouring Glen of Imaal are off-limits. It’s military land, well posted with warning signs.
SLEEPING
Glenmalure Hostel ( 01-830 4555; www.anoige.ie; Greenane; dm €15; Jun-Aug, Sat only Sep-May) No phone, no electricity (lighting is by gas), just a rustic two-storey cottage with 19 beds and running water. This place has a couple of heavyweight literary links: it was once owned by WB Yeats’ femme fatale, Maud Gonne, and was also the setting for JM Synge’s play, Shadow of a Gunman. It’s an isolated place, but it is beautifully situated beneath Lugnaquilla.
Glenmalure Log Cabin ( 01-269 6979; www.glenmalure.com; 11 Glenmalure Pines, Greenane; 2 nights €200-290, 3 nights