Crohane
Watch the hike on YouTube
Misty Mountain Top
Cruachán - 650m
I had been looking forward to this one but for some reason I had been putting it off. When heading to Killarney via Barraduff and Glenflesk Crohane stands an imposing mountain when seen from the road. Its a road I have often driven and it was always going to be done at some stage
I had seen some comment about access issues, but they seemed to be old enough and it had put me off. Eventually decided to bite the bullet after seeing a fairly recent comment regarding Crohane on the Mountain Views Website
Room for a few cars beside a farm house which didn’t seem to be a problem. A short trip up the road and you’re onto mountain road pretty quickly.
Looking back down the meadow on the way up. Its really beautiful.
The first half of the trek up is just mountain road and is easy going. Met the farmer on the way up and we’ a good chat. I love the way they pronounce the mountain. It’s a way softer that how I verbalise it and seems to be more related to the Irish spelling than the harsh -hane that I pronounce.
The views over towards the Mangerton Range are impressive
Eventually the road peters out and its onto open hillside. It was fairly wet, as was expected after the recent weather. It’s just a matter of picking your path to the foot of the final pull up when the slope becomes very much steeper. There’s nothing tricky to any of it as it mostly grass strewn with some rocks. Overall it’s grand.
Views from the top were non-existent and the weather was fairly atrocious. Didn’t hang around long and worked my way back down. It was cloudy and I did rely on my watch for navigation by using the map function to follow the path I had come up, to go back down. Even though it’s a relatively low hill, when the weather was like it was, you could easily go off track. I really need to get a better hang of the map reading in poor weather.
Looking back up to see Crohane clear is nearly expected now at this stage and to be honest i’ve stopped getting pissed off when it happens. I had a really enjoyable hike up there and getting views, while nice, isn’t the end all and be all.
It was my first, what i’d call big hike of the year, Strickeen a few weeks earlier was. a lot simpler and had been done previously, but the open hillside here was great. There’s something about it that I just really enjoy.
On a technical gear side it was my first time trying to use the Røde mics properly. I had tried in the Paps the week before, but the weather meant I didn’t use it much. On this trip I didn’t get it right which is why the sound for some parts isn’t great, but I learned a lot with it, and when I did get it right, I really liked the sound off it. Of course listening to myself isn’t great, but at least I think I may have the annoying harsh wind noise sorted.
Hopefully now this will be the start of the year proper and looking forward to many more days on the mountains,
Ed