A weather window.

The forecast for today was perfect, and I woke at the first buzz of my alarm, and immediately had that horrible-Oh jeez, I can't be bothered feeling, it was an age since I have been up this early. There is such a temptation to snooze the alarm, or just turn it off. But this was the day, I was in the right place at the right time and I managed to put those thoughts aside and hopped out of my cozy bed. I had prepared my breakfast last night so scoffed that as quietly as possible, said good bye to Joyce and left the van at 5.40 with head torch showing the way. This is where, the wee bit effort the night before is invaluable. I knew exactly where I was heading, and probably would not have found the place I needed to branch off the main path had I not put that effort in.
It was a beautiful starlit morning, the moon had slipped behind the hills so wasn't helping too much, but I managed quite easily to work my way up towards my first peak of the day Cruach Mhor 932m. I could see its outline in the sky, so I knew pretty much where I was heading and got some nice shots of the morning sky before the sun rise. Some of the rocks were a little slippy, bit I never gave this much though, just putting it down to the rock type. I reached the first summit of Cruach Mhor just a few minutes after the sun rose and it was pretty spectacular, there's a so called "grotto" up there, it just appears to me as a very well built stone cairn with a window in it with a Virgin Mary statue. I spoke to a man on the decent who explained that it was a single man who built it over many years, carrying stones to the summit from further down. A year after he completed it he was admitted to a mental asylum...... 

I took a few photos as the sun rose. The next section of ridge is easy down to a col, but after that it becomes much more tricky with big pinnacles and awkward down climbs on them, they would normally have been fine but by now I had realised it was actually frosty and the lichen and damp rock were iced up. Trouble is the rock strata all slopes the wrong way, the bits in the sun were no use to me. I needed to be on the crest but it all sloped away from the sun so I couldn't really trust to standing up on it, however with a bit care, I managed to work my way up to Big Gun 939m the decent to the next col was easier, then some more knife edge ridge led up the next summit Cnoc na Pieste 988m,  

The moss and grass was all frozen where not in the sun. After this point the day become an easy grassy ridge walk, I traversed Maolan Bui 973m, Cnoc an Chullin 958m and was heading for Carrauntoohil Ireland's highest peak, but upon approach it looked a long slog from from the top of the Devils Ladder col to the summit, so I took a wee detour left on the way up to climb Caher 1001m. Then I sped back as quickly as possible climb Carrauntoohil 1039m with its huge iron cross and summit shelter at he summit. So according to the list of Irish Munro's that is 7 of the 13 Irish Munro's climbed, to be honest a couple are just bumps on the ridge. There are a couple more here too, Caher west top, and Beenkeragh (Ireland 2nd highest peak (1010m). In a big day you could climb them all but that would miss the point. There's another classic horseshoe waiting for the next time, plus I would rather enjoy some of it another time with one of my walking buddies from home. My decent was to the west down Brother O'Shea's gully which Keith had recommended to me. I had a quick peek down the Devils Ladder ladder when I passed it and it looks a bit like a death trap, steep loose, and full of big boulders directly down the fall line. Brother O'Shea's, was steep, loose and  full of big boulders but at least it weaved around a bit so if you dislodged something it wasn't as likely to land on someone's head. It was actually a really cool way off the mountain, and is quite intricate. 

I spoke to a friendly Irish couple who had visited Scotland for some winter climbing, an English lad who's brother worked in Helensburgh, and and Irish man who was quite impressed with the route I had done today. I would not recommend the Devils Ladder to anyone who is thinking about climbing this hill, there are plenty other alternatives. 

What I would recommend to anyone is, to go and climb in these hills. I cannot actually think of anything similar in Scotland, it is a proper mountain range, with pointed summits, narrow ridges, very steep slopes and stunning lochs (loughs) in all its coires. Its right up there in my "best of" list, and would be fabulous also in winter conditions.
Joyce and the boys had left the van and were walking the Hags Glen loop and I had hoped to meet them when I descended but my detour to Caher had probably cost me an hour, so I had to catch up with them on the path out. They had really enjoyed that walk, and it was about 8km long and climbed a couple of hundred metres with a couple of river crossing thrown in for good measure, so Logan, and Callum did well as did Mum for getting them around it.

I haven't counted up my total ascent for the day but it was quite a lot, I hadn't been on a hill for a few months but I don't feel too bad after it, must have been the calorific value of Ireland's finest Guiness that got me round.

We got back to Cronin's Yard and sat in the sun for a while blethering to other people. I also contacted a tyre centre in Killarney and had missed getting another (proper campervan CR rated) tyre by 20 minutes, the courier had left. It was hard to leave but we needed supplies and a "proper" campsite, well some did. So we left and headed to Killarney, got a Lidls and got parked in a campsite which listed as "close" to the town centre....not. Another 2.8kms there on wee Logans legs after his big hike today meant a taxi home afterwards. 

We ate in a place called The Ranch, which was OK and reasonably priced, sort of Wild West styled place with cowboys, Indians, prairie wagons, a saloon door and a jail, if only we could have locked the pests up for a night or two........lol.
No Scrabble this evening, I was knackered, but happy and needed sleep.