Wicklow Mountains National Park
Ireland Day 7 | Hiking in Wicklow Mountains National Park | August 2025
For our last day in Ireland, we had our hearts set on spending some time in the Wicklow Mountains. We did a lot of research on what would be the most time and cost efficient way to get there while also giving us as much time to hike as possible, and eventually landed on taking the Kevin Bus from Dublin to Glendalough. The bus leaves from St. Stephen’s Green every day at 11am and then returns around 6pm, with the drive being an hour and a half long. It cost 23 Euros per person, and accepted the Leap card. While we wish we had more than 4 hours to hike, we thought this would be the best option as it was at least half the price of other tours where you travel on their schedule, and it seemed too complicated to piece together city buses to make it to the Northernmost end of the mountains and just start walking, not necessarily to the prettiest scenery. It wasn’t perfect, but this bus made it simple: meet here, ride down to the heart of the mountains in Glendalough, where there are historic sites, visitor services, and many hikes you can do, and get a ride back at the end of the day.
We purposely chose not to do this on Monday, which was a holiday, but as it was still a beautiful summer day, it was still quite busy. We got to the bus stop a half hour early to wait in line, but there ended up being two buses that showed up close to 11 (we wondered why they maybe couldn’t have one go a little earlier in the day, but hey, we won’t complain!). But before boarding the bus, we did make another stop at the Beanhive to get another sandwich after enjoying it so much the day before! Once everyone was boarded, we made the long drive through the suburbs of Dublin and South towards the mountains!
When we arrived in Glendalough at 12:30, it was exactly how you’d imagine a national park within an hour’s drive of a major city to be at noon on a beautiful summer day — busy! The parking lots were packed, there were long lines for the bathrooms, and the crowds were a little overwhelming. Thankfully the further we got from the initial visitor center, the smaller the crowds became.
We had initially planned out which hike we thought we wanted to do — we thought we could attempt to hike 7 miles around the lakes on a loop trail in less than four hours. However, when we came to a trail sign, we learned that the back half of the loop was closed, so that made our time spent here considerably more relaxing than we had planned. Honestly, I wasn’t too upset about that!
Our walk started with walking through a cemetery and ruins from a historic cathedral, monastery, and other historic buildings. We learned a little about the history, and Curtis found a letterbox. We then continued onto the trail towards the lakes. This hike began much differently from our hike up Carrauntoohil, as we were walking through a lush forest and surrounded by trees. We passed by the lower lake, then as we approached the upper one we took a side trail that followed the stream up to the Poulanass Waterfall.
After taking a few pictures, we debated which trails we wanted to take and how much elevation gain our still-sore legs could handle, but ultimately decided that it would be worth it to make it to the top of the ridge on the South side of the lake for the views. We took it slow, following the Spinc trail up several zigzags, sometimes wanting to stop at view points for a rest but finding them busy, so we pushed on. We finally made it to the top of the climb, then wandered further along the trail until we found a quiet spot to sit and eat our sandwich. From here, we could see where the construction was going on, and could also see the continuation of the trail we had thought about taking all around the lake. I do believe we at least got to enjoy the best views that this hike had to offer from this spot with panoramic views up and down the ‘Valley of Two Lakes’ (or Glen-two-loch)!
We eventually made our way back down, and then to the side of the lake where we watched the ducks floating in the waves near the shore (it was quite windy that day). We took some more pictures, then eventually started making our way back to the trailhead, the cemetery, and finally the parking lot where we boarded our bus back to Dublin. Our 4 hours here went by too fast, but maybe it we ever find our way back to Ireland, we’ll find a way to spend a lot more time here…maybe even backpack through the whole range? Who knows! But for this trip, this was a great way to end our time in Ireland, and definitely left us wanting more.
