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Guided Walking Holidays in Mayo & Connemara, Ireland
 

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Posts tagged with: 'Mulranny'

Ten Great Short Mayo Walks, Part Two

Posted on August 15, 2012 by Barry Murphy

I want to share with you 10 beautiful, but short, Mayo walks. These are places to go for a short, easy stroll and admire the surroundings. Bring the kids. I’ve chosen 10 places that you can easily reach in your car or, preferably, on your bike. No need for hiking boots to get to any of these spots, each of which is wonderfully representative of Mayo!

Part One, with 5 places, is here. Now for the remaining five spots to go visit.

These are places you will not need hiking boots to reach and, while most are more or less by the road, all are within a short, flat walk of one.

6 Causeway at Mulranny 
7  Newport River leaving Beltra Lough
8  Limestone Pavement at Clonbur Wood
9  Erris Head Look Out Post, Belmullet
10  Minaun, Achill Island

 6. Causeway at Mulranny

When the railway (now The Greenway cycle and walking track) came to Mulranny in the late 1890′s, a hotel (now The Mulranny Park Hotel) was built. Down from the hotel, and in order to reach the nearby beach in greater comfort, a causeway was built across the saltmarshes. Park your car or bike at the hotel, descend the steps across the road, walk the causeway, take in the beautiful views all around and suck in the sea air. Then return for a beverage in the hotel’s bar, overlooking Clew Bay (certainly one of the nicest views any Mayo bar can offer). Total walking time from car or bike, up to one hour (beware traffic when crossing the road).

I can’t seem to locate my picture of this, so will have to go take a new one and insert later ! 

7. Newport River leaving Beltra Lough

Mayo walks - Newport River

The Newport River

 The most remote spot on my list is located in the middle of a Castlebar – Westport – Newport triangle in west Mayo, at the southern end of Beltra Lough, in the middle of nowhere. It’s a wonderful mix of native woodland, reed beds, river, lake and bog. This is inland Mayo at its natural best, with the beautiful mountains of Nephin Mór and Birreencorragh as backdrops to the north. Total walking time from car or bike, maybe 45 minutes (off-road).

 

8. Limestone Pavement at Clonbur Wood

Mayo walks - Clonbur Wood

Clonbur limestone pavement

Our ‘mini Burren’ is a beautiful area of exposed limestone, with dwarfed trees and prostrate shrubs eking out an existence in any tiny piece of soil they can find. A magical place of grykes and clints on the shores of Lough Mask. You’ll have to walk from the carpark at Clonbur village to reach this, but on forest tracks, runners will do fine. Total walking time, a good hour.

(psst, this is actually just inside Galway, but don’t tell anyone…)

9. Erris Head Look Out Post

Mayo walks - Erris Head

Erris Head

At the very tip of the wild and wonderful Mullet peninsula, out beyond Belmullet town in NW Mayo, lies Erris Head with its fantastic ocean views. Walk for 40 minutes from the carpark at Glenlara to reach an excellent example of Ireland’s World War II marine and coastguard service Look Out Posts that were dotted all along neutral Ireland’s coast. This is ocean coastline at its finest. Total walking time approx. 1.5 hours.

10. Minaun, Achill Island

Mayo Walks - Minaun Heights

Minaun Heights

If your car can handle it, drive on up towards the mast atop Minaun and look west, across Keel Strand and Keem Bay to the top of Croaghan beyond. This amazing view is one of the finest in Mayo. The winds are strong too. Stunning is too weak a word for it. Total time walking around in the wind, as long as you like.

 

I hope you’ve enjoyed this list and get out to some of these spots, whether rural or urban. Just relax, take it all in and experience Mayo walks.

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World Wetlands Day 2012

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Barry Murphy

Thursday, February 2nd is World Wetlands Day. Check out its origins here.

World Wetlands Day

World Wetlands Day poster

World Wetlands Day is about appreciating the vital role wetlands play in our ecosystems and protecting them. Here in Mayo, we are blessed with many wetland areas, from our blanket bogs, dotted with small lakes and bogpools, to our ‘great western lakes’, like Conn, Cullin, Carra and Mask, to our coastal sites, like Mulranny saltmarshes and the brackish lake of Furnace. Indeed, we have 3 Ramsar wetlands sites of international importance, in the Sheskin Knockmoyle Bog Complex, the Owenduff Bog Complex and the Blacksod & Broadhaven Bays area.

All Ramsar sites can be viewed in the database here.

 

World Wetlands Day

Reversal of bog drainage through dams

For long periods, Ireland drained its bogs in order to lower the water table and therefore dry out the peat for harvesting. In some places, this peat production has now ceased and efforts are being made to allow the bogs to refill with water and return to something approaching their natural state. The picture, left, of a blocked drain in north Mayo illustrates how this is being achieved.

On February 2nd, I will be out walking on the bogs to celebrate World Wetlands Day and I will share pictures here afterwards. Come and join me, if you like.

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Heritage Week 2011

Posted on August 23, 2011 by Barry Murphy
National Heritage Week 2011

National Heritage Week 2011

It’s Heritage Week 2011 this week. See if you can get along to any of these events being held here in Mayo.

1. Tour of Archaeological Sites of North Mayo.

This bus tour leaves Ballina tourism office on Sat 27th at 10 am and returns at 2.30 pm.

2. Partry Heritage Day.

Ecologist Chris Huxley leads a walk, at Partry Estate, from noon to 4 pm on Sunday 28th.

3. Talk on Mayo’s Farming Heritage.

An illustrated talk at Ballycroy National Park visitor centre, on Sunday 28th, from 3 pm to 4 pm.

4. Guided Walk of Achill Beg Island.

Leaving from Cloghmore pier on Achill Island at 10 am on Saturday 27th, returning at 4 pm.

5. Guided Walk of Tóchar Daithí Bhán.

Child-freindly walk at Ballycroy National Park visitor centre, from noon to 1 pm, on Friday 26th, Saturday 27th and Sunday 28th.

6. Mulranny Loop Guided Walk.

Meet at Mulranny Park Hotel on Sunday 28th, at 11 am. The group will return around 2pm.

Above is just a sample of the impressive 29 unique events taking place in Mayo this week. Some of them are repeated several times for convenience.

For the full listing and more detail on what’s on offer this week, visit the official website here.

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Hill Walking in Mayo

Posted on July 1, 2011 by Barry Murphy

Mayo is a great destination for moderate level hill walking in Ireland. With mountains to no more than 820 m, many with fabulous sea views, this place gives the walker fantastic panorama views of the wild West of Ireland coastline and its vast internal blanket bogs. We enjoy large areas of upland and bog, not spoiled by roads cutting through them. We have nice moderate mountain peaks, perfect for hill walking over 5 to 8-hour days.

Spots like Achill, Clew Bay and around Leenane boast some of the finest hill walking in Ireland. Lesser known high points like Corrannabinnia, Barrclashcame and Maumtrasna offer so much more than the overused Croagh Patrick. Standing on top of Croaghaun, boasting some of Europe’s highest cliffs, is a real treat not to be missed.

Down below, lovely West Mayo villages and small towns, like Newport, Mulranny, Westport and Belmullet will entertain you during the evenings. Not to forget Cong, the prettiest village in Ireland, standing beneath the mountains of South Mayo and North Galway.

So far this year the hill walking has been great. The severe lack of rain in the first several months of the year, following the incredible big freeze over the New Year period, has left the ground quite dry. Even the recent June rain has done little to make the upland bogs as wet as they normally would be.

I had a big group up The Bangor Trail last weekend and, while there was of course surface water, there was not the usual energy sapping trudge through the peat covered hills. This walk brings you to no more than 320 m altitude, a low level example of what is on offer.

Here is a selection of photos of hill walking in Mayo. Enjoy. If ou’d like to conme hill walking in Ireland, do get in touch and we’ll organise something for you and your group of walkers.

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100 km Walking & Cycling Loop

Posted on June 15, 2011 by Barry Murphy

Last week, at the first Mayo Walking Seminar, held in West Mayo’s lovely Mulranny Park Hotel, I was speaking on hillwalking and the Nephin Beg Mountain Range. I used the opportunity to present my dream of a world-class 100 km walking and cycling loop in Mayo.

The loop, which I called the “Nephin Beg Mountains Loop” would encircle the mountains of Northwest Mayo and bring the walker or cyclist along rivers and small bog lakes, through blanket bog and by the seashore. Even better, at four points, there would be the opportunity for cyclists and long distance walkers to head off on spurs leaving the central loop. One would head towards Ballycastle, The Céide Fields and the north Mayo coastline. A second would branch off towards Belmullet and The Mullet peninsula, while the third would bring the visitor west to Achill Island. Finally, the fourth branch from the loop would go south, to the tourist hot-spots of Westport and Croagh Patrick.

Even better, The Bangor Trail (for walkers only) would bisect the 100 km loop straight down the middle, giving serious walkers another choice.

Not all walkers are in to hillwalking. A lot of this low-level loop is already in place. The new Great Western Greenway cycleway and walking trail, built on the old dismantled Westport to Achill railway line, makes up some 18 km of the 100 envisaged. The Western Way national waymarked walking trail meanders for some 25 km north of Newport into the wilderness and is hugely underutilised and neglected. There are already plans afoot to extend the Greenway northwards from Mulranny, in the general direction of Belmullet and Bangor Erris.

What I am calling for that is new consists of two parts. First, a modest 3 km stretch needs building to take the Western Way off-road in its entirety in this area. That’s hardly a big ask, as the land to be crossed is either Coillte or Bord na Móna owned. The second section would be around 6 or 7 km long, along the northern border of my Loop. Again, not a major task, with the land once again being mostly in Coillte hands.

While the new Greenway is nice, it is nowhere near international quality in length or variety of scenery. This “Nephin Beg Mountains Loop” most certainly would be.

Here is my aspirational map of the finished product. I think it can and should be done. What do you think ?

The solid red lines represent already existing tracks and trails. The dot-dash lines are what I am putting forward here.

hill walking Mayo Ireland

Nephin Beg Mountains Loop

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Mayo, God Help Us

Posted on May 27, 2011 by Barry Murphy

At The Adventure Weekend last week, we had great traffic at our combined Great Western Greenway stand. Mayo County Council’s walking development officer joined Tourism Pure Walking Holidays and Clew Bay Bike Hire on the stand and we attracted good numbers of enquiries.

See our stand below.

The main reaction we were getting was how Mayo is such a beautiful place, but perhaps underdeveloped as a tourist destination. I’d like to think we can grow, but in a sustainable way that is sensitive to our spectacular environment.

Mayo is blessed with really special landscapes. To me, our vast blanket bogs are a wonder of nature. Our mountains, while not that high, are fabulous for walking holidays. Mayo has great cliff-top walks, with huge views over the North Atlantic. Our offshore islands add a further dimension to the attraction of the county – they’re like another county in their own right, somehow even further west than Mayo itself.

Come and enjoy a tranquil morning sea layaking on the becalmed waters of the inner Clew Bay. Cycle at a leisurely pace along the Greenway or our tiny boithríns with next to no traffic. Come on a hike up The Bangor Trail and forget about time for a while.

Yesterday, I was up the huge forests to the west of the Nephin Beg mountains. I was just strolling along, taking it easy, when I came across an otter in a small stream. Deer tracks were around and I saw where they had bark stripped some trees. The cottage in the picture below was abandoned and somehow swallowed up by the surrounding conifers. The track that eventually reached the roadway from the cottage was covered in thick, wet mosses and under several centimetres of still, brown bog water.

That’s Mayo. He has helped us already.

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