Discover Glendalough

A monastic valley at the heart of the Wicklow Mountains

Glendalough sits in a glacially carved valley in County Wicklow, its name an anglicisation of the Irish Gleann Dá Loch, the valley of the two lakes. St Kevin founded a monastery here in the 6th century, and the settlement that grew around it survived and flourished for roughly six hundred years before its decline, leaving behind one of Ireland's most complete monastic sites: a round tower close to thirty metres high, a roofed cathedral, several smaller churches including St Kevin's Kitchen, high crosses and a graveyard still occasionally used today. The Lower Lake sits closest to the monastic ruins, while the Upper Lake, reached by a short walk further up the valley, is ringed by the steeper ground of Camaderry, Conavalla and Lugduff, and it is here that the valley's wilder character shows itself.

There is no town centre at the monastic site itself, which catches a fair number of first-time visitors out. The actual village, Laragh, with its restaurants, pubs, shops and places to stay, is a short walk or drive down the R755, and it is where most people who stay overnight actually base themselves. Glendalough is also the main gateway to Wicklow Mountains National Park, with the park's information office on site, and it is genuinely one of Ireland's most-visited heritage attractions and a standard Dublin day trip, which means the two car parks at the visitor centre and the Upper Lake fill by mid-morning on a good-weather day. Walk past the round tower and onto the Spinc, the boardwalk trail that climbs the cliff above the Upper Lake, and the crowds thin fast; it is the single best thing to do here that most day-trippers never get to.