Bluestacks Hill Walk

The walk is (very approximately) route number 48 of Patrick Simms and Tony Whilde, Walk Guide: West of Ireland, 3rd ed., Gill and Macmillan, 1997.

See also route 25 of David Herman, Hill Walkers Donegal, Shanksmare Publications, 2000 .

The walk (2005-07-17), with Letterkenny I.T. Hillwalking Club, took about six and a half hours at a leisurely pace. The weather was good: temperature about 20 degrees; bright sunshine until we hit the clouds, which stayed with us most of the afternoon. Incidentally, the Bluestacks (Na Cruacha Gorma) are so called because of the 'blue' clouds/mist that seems to hang on them at most times. You would be quite lucky to do this walk without some cloud at the top. We had the advantage of a local guide, so we did not follow any predetermined route. The pictures are sequenced according to our progress. The lack of landscape pictures from the top is explained by the cloud.

The pictures

There are three copies of the pictures: (i) the thumbnails -- visible; (ii) medium sized (usually 1/4 of the original), click on thumbnail; and (iii) large (usually 1/2 of original, or cropped full resolution), click on 'Large'. If anyone likes any of the pictures, I will usually have one that is double the size of 'Large' and can supply it on request (e.g. I can put it on the web for you to download, see email address below).