The Middle Earth Glen Experience

Next Bards In The Woods meet up here will now be in 2015.
Watch this space for a date and time in the future.

The Glen, below Knocknarea, west of Sligo Town is a seemingly very magical place to visit. On arrival it is a total senses aroused wonder.


Finding it, for the first time, can be a bit tricky. I have embeded my Google Map for here to assist you finding the location.

This is what the entrance looks like now ...


A lot of people looking this up will see pics of the entrance like this ...


but those gates are gone and the hawthorns etc. have grown rampantly.

Another landmark to look out for was a Holy Well white wall
that used to look like this


but now it has grown over to look like this ...


I will serve directions to here below, but first,
lets take you into The Glen for a moment.

First you have to walk along a path.
This is way above a beautiful shoreline like this ...


and this is what the path looks like, Claire is walking it here.


The path eventually comes to a bit of a muddy T-Junction of paths,
and you go left, which does not seem obvious,

... but then you come out to this wonder, and this time someone is camping here.


Here's a couple more pics before I give you directions


The walk to the end takes as much as 20 minutes, though the pathway gets narrower, muddier and more overgrown, and visually not as interesting.

For the first 5 or 10 minutes into this Glen its as if the earth has parted to open up this hidden valley. It is awesome with its tall trees, cliffs of long ivy, dripping waters and lots of green.


This is a wonderful place to gather for music, poetry, reflection and picnics.

Now to give you some directions for getting here.
First is the Google Map

Do use the larger map, zoom, and Street View options to find out more.


View The Glen, Co. Sligo in a larger map

I will now share some pics I took from Google Street View.

From the N4 make sure you take the turning to Strandhill and not to Ballasadare, which is quite easy to do by mistake. In this pic this means straight ahead under the railway bridge.


Keep going along this road until you get to a rounsabout crossroads signposted as Strandhill to the left, Carrowmore to the right and Knocknarea straight on. You go straight on! ... so second exit, as they say.


Soon you will come to these crossroads, not a good picture, where you turn left ...


and the road after the left turn starts like this


and you continue a km or two and street view shows this, the well with the white wall on the right and a small parking area on the left, and another on the right, which is two of a few parking places like this here.


Now go back to the top of this article to see what the 
entrance, view and path to The Glen looks like

So now back to The Glen and a few pics and videos of music sessions of here :-)


The awesome bodhran player and singer of Kila




The world famous Keith Harkin singer of Celtic Thunder




Seamie O'Dowd with a song about The Glen




Dean Mahon ...




Old Hannah ...




The Deans ...




Alan Reynolds ...




Teaser with Alan Reynolds ...




Claudia Schwab ...




Enjoy The Glen, Co. Sligo.


Comments

  1. Anonymous8 June 2014 at 13:29

    Incredible! Thank you SO much John! We have enjoyed a return visit to the Glen--this time with fantastic musical accompaniment. Wish we could be there today... Elyn Aviva and Gary White

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. John Willmott8 June 2014 at 21:24

      Thank you so much for that, Elyn and Gary. In a few minutes I will start on a blog post about today which was a lovely afternoon there, but really is not going to add much, if anything, to what is here. The best I will do is explain why it was a lovely afternoon with wonderful people I have not met before :-)

      Delete
    2. Anonymous12 June 2014 at 21:58

      Hi John,
      I do love the Glen. Been visiting it for years now and am always in awe of the beauty. Amantha XX

      Delete

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