The dog has hurt her belly, went to the vet to be cleaned up and antibiotics, so is convalescing for a few days. Instead of my usual run with her I biked through Valleymount, taking the "Water Hole Bypass" (any suitably adventurous local will figure this out), stopping at the first forestry track on the left past the summit. After removing shoes and top and suitably hiding these and my bike I set off for my very first mountain adventure barefoot. Moanbane is by no means the highest in the Wicklow Mountains but the view from the top is still stunning. Someone has kindly built a very smart cairn instead of the former wooden post marking the summit. Today it was clear and I could see to the West the whole of our lake and far, far into the interior of Ireland, and to the East all of the major Wicklow peaks and the sea in the distance.
The barefoot bit worked OK. No need to worry about filling one's shoes with muddy water in the numerous peaty boggy bits. The first part is through forestry area and the route follows what, I suppose, once was a fire break. It is now less than a track, but so, so beautiful. The floor is covered in mosses with numerous little streams crossing. Because there is still a small gap between the trees here, the sunlight filters through and highlights the many greens.
Once I broke out of the forested area it was rough grass, moss and heather underfoot. The most prickly was last year's heather, but quite manageable providing you check where you put your feet.
Some might call it a hill. But my father said anything over 1000' was a mountain and on that basis it is a mountain. At the top, just past the cairn aforementioned, there is a lake. "Lake" is an overstatement - it is about 10m x 30m and not more than a few inches deep. That's the water on the top. Underneath it is squishy peaty muddy stuff which is nice to wade through. My love of mud predates and perhaps is a precursor to Alison's recent discovery of healing clay.
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