Over the Vee: the mountain road north from Lismore

North of Lismore the land rises straight into the Knockmealdown Mountains, and one road goes over them: the R668 to Clogheen, through a notch in the ridge called the Vee. It is about 17km from the town to the viewpoint at the top, a short drive that takes longer than it should because you keep stopping. This is how to do it properly.

Leaving town

Cross Lismore Bridge, with the castle above you on the left, and take the R668 north. The road climbs gently at first through farmland and forestry on the lower slopes. Off to the east, on the same slopes, is Mount Melleray, the Cistercian abbey. Do not plan a visit. The monks left in January 2025, when the community joined Roscrea and Mellifont in a new union, and the Irish Examiner reported in August 2026 that the abbey is now the Irish campus of Ave Maria University, a US Catholic college, and closed to the public.

The climb

Above the forestry the road opens onto heather moorland and steepens into a run of bends. It is narrow, with a low stone wall on the drop side near the top. Pull in where there is room rather than stopping on a bend. Rhododendron has spread across the slopes here; a Geograph photographer looking down on the road from the Sugarloaf called it "a major problem", and visitor guides time a trip for late May or early June, when it flowers purple across the hillsides. The county boundary is close to the gap, and the viewpoint itself is on the Tipperary side.

The view

At the Vee itself there is a car park and a stretch of wall, and the reason for the drive is on the far side of it. The Golden Vale opens out below, a patchwork of fields running north, and the Galty Mountains stand across it on a clear day. Cloud often sits in the gap even when Lismore is bright, so if the ridge looks grey from the bridge in town, expect to see very little.

Below the road on the Tipperary side, in a hollow under the slope, is Bay Lough, a small lake that local stories have long called bottomless. Treat it as something to look at, not a swim.

Grubb's grave

On the slope of Sugarloaf Hill above the Vee car park stands a beehive-shaped stone tomb. It belongs to Samuel Grubb of Castle Grace, a landowner and former High Sheriff of Tipperary, who asked to be buried standing upright on the mountain so he could keep watching over his land below. The Geograph record of the monument says the request was carried out after his death in 1921; local versions add his dog, and some say the men who buried him put him in upside down. The Geograph record places it on the shortest route up Sugarloaf from the Vee car park. That is a hill walk on open mountainside, so go with boots, a map and a forecast.

Down to Clogheen, or back

From the top the R668 drops north to Clogheen in Tipperary. Most people simply turn round and drive back to Lismore. If you carry on, Cahir is about 35km from Lismore by this road.

Practical points

There is no bus over the Vee, so you need a car or a bicycle and good legs. Allow an hour and a half from Lismore and back with stops, longer if you walk to Bay Lough or up to Grubb's grave. The drive is at its best in late spring and early summer for the flowering slopes, but it is worth doing in any month the cloud is off the top.

The obvious pairing is the castle gardens in the morning, which open at 11am in season, then Ballysaggartmore Towers on the R666 after lunch, and the Vee in the late afternoon. Our full-day itinerary sets it out in that order.