The Great Wall of ...Norther Ireland

The Moune Mountains are located in Northern Ireland in County Down and they are some of the best granite mountains in Ireland, where quarries were huge part of the Kingdom of Mourne economy. These rugged, granite peaks are surrounded by golden beaches, deep forests, and emerald fields.

The beauty of the mountains was immortalized in one of William Percy French’s songs: “Where the Mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea”. And believe me, they give you this feeling once you get to the top and look down to start your descent.

Our challenge began at the Bloody Bridge in Newcastle,

climbing Slieve Donard highest peak (850m), where Slieve is from the Irish word “sliabh”, meaning mountain.

We trekked up to the Mourne Wall, a man-made, dry-stone wall built between 1904 and 1922, in order to provide work during a period of high unemployment. The wall is 2m high, a meter thick, and over 35 km long, lying across the summits of 15 of the surrounding peaks.

Unfortunately, we couldn’t finish the pre-planned hike as the weather was mental all day long. We had to put on and take off are waterproof gear for the duration of the hike, as the weather was mental. It was sunny at the beginning, then started raining, windy, misty and finally when we get to the top of Slieve Donard it also started hailing. But as it wasn’t enough we also had thunders and lightings all the way down. And surprise surprise! We got to the valley, guess what? The sky cleared up again, as if nothing has ever happened before. At least we were able to dry up.