Challenge - The Wicklow Way, South to North

The idea


We had never really been to Ireland, as a day trip to Dublin doesn't really count, so we thought that walking a long distance path would be a good way to meet some people and get a proper feel for the country. To show how little I knew I was surprised to find Ireland is in the same time zone as England, drives on the left and uses the same type of electric plug!

After some thought we chose the Wicklow Way. We liked the idea of walking in the mountains and it seemed a good length. We discarded the idea of using a company to organise the whole holiday, mainly due to cost, but I also fancied planning the whole thing myself.


The Wicklow Way website was a mine of useful information, from maps to accommodation and I sent off for the Wicklow Way guidebook to help me with planning. This book gave several excellent reasons why it might be better to begin at the southern section and walk north but then concluded with describing the route north to south!



As this was the way it was described I booked my flights and then accommodation using the very helpful website which gave details of a selection of places to stay and made it simple to send messages to all my preferred choices. All the B and Bs emailed me back straight away. 



Following discussions with Darina at Ballinavortha House which is near Clonegal, I decided it would be more sensible to get a bus to Tullow from Dublin and walk south to north. This would avoid possible problems catching a country bus on a bank holiday weekend. Of course this meant I needed to change all my accommodation options! Luckily this was not a problem as I was booking well in advance.



I was a little concerned that we might get lost as we would now be doing the trail in reverse and the guide book I had purchased had instructions for the other way! More of this later.