Wicklow Mountains

The Wicklows rise south of Dublin - we could see them from the Guinness Storehouse two weeks earlier. They are not spectacular mountains, even by Irish standards. The modest range of ancient hills forms a high plateau surrounded by glacial valleys that I can easily imagine were once heavily forested (the mountains themselves were also once heavily forested). Glendalough is probably the best known of these valleys (previous post). But we also drove up the nearby Glenmacnass Valley and its waterfall, where tannin-colored water cascaded down several hundred feet of rock (granite, I think).

The high country (2000-3000') forms a landscape that could almost be mistaken for alpine areas in the Rockies or northern tundra - since the blanket bog is really not that different. There were plenty of sheep, of course. We did a loop up Glenmacnass and through Sally Gap, before heading back down another valley to Enniskerry and Bray, on the coast.