Photographing the Forest and Nature of the Wonderful Glendalough in Co. Wicklow, Ireland
Trees and Mountains in Glendalough
Recently, I’ve been on sort of a Landscape and nature photography kick, so on a recent weekend, we headed to one of my favourite places to photograph on the east coast of Ireland, a place called Glendalough.
Glendalough is a beautiful forested park in a glacial valley nestled in the mountains of Co. Wicklow, itself a national park. It has two lakes formed by the retreating glaciers millions of years ago, and is also home to a famous monastic site from the Middle Ages.
Getting there is about a 40 minute drive from Dublin City, into the neighbouring Co. Wicklow and up through the Wicklow mountains. The journey itself is quite scenic, but the day we travelled it was quite foggy, so we couldn’t see much. Once there there are numerous trails and routes around the park and through the forests.
We started from the east end of the valley at the Glendalough Hotel, a famous local landmark. We planned to do the walking route which goes from there past the lower lake to the upper lake, but just as we got out of the car park we were surprised by a family of deer which just hanging out by the visitor centre.
While deer have long lived in the valley, apparently they have recently become more used to the humans who visit there. There are lots of signs up telling you not to feed the deer which I don’t recall seeing before. Of all the years I’ve been coming to Glendalough, this is the first time I’ve ever encountered deer like this.
Leaving the deer behind we headed up the walking trail which winds its way through the trees up one side of the valley, past the famous round tower and former monastic site. It has a very “Lord of the rings” vibe to it, although this is kind of ruined when a large group of tourists goes plodding by. There was a low mist there as we started out and there wasn’t much of a breeze so it was kind of mystical. There’s so much to photograph here, you can get a bit overwhelmed, but personally I have a thing for trying to photograph the less obvious subjects. I look for details in the undergrowth or unusual trees. It’s also a place where you will often see wild shamrocks growing in the roots of trees. There’s actually no specific species of plant called “shamrock”. It’s really just a type of clover and there are several species that are considered “Shamrocks”. The type you find here are not something that I’ve seen in other places that often, with the regular clover being far more common.
Another thing I find fascinating is that some of the roots of the trees have formed steps in the banks of the trail and they look like little paths for gnomes or fairies or some other kinds of fantastical woodland creatures. There’s also lots of boulders strewn about, another legacy of the retreating glacier.
Half way up the trail there is a spot where you can go down to the lake and as I headed down to photograph the mist I was greeted by a curious family of ducks. This was turning into a wildlife encounter trip. The ducks were quite inquisitive and were not afraid of the humans at all, in fact they were probably hoping for some food. After a while they got bored with me they headed off to pester a family that was having a picnic.
We continued our journey up the trail and passed more of the gorgeous scenery. The gnarled trees and the heavy undergrowth providing a veritable tableau of green part.
At the upper lake, there are a number of mountain streams that flow into the lake. As we got there the mist finally lifted and the sun came out, illuminating the golden copper colour of the rocks in the water. The lake itself still had some mist on it and this made the scenery even more fantastical, with some of the photos I got looking like Jurassic park or some fantastical location.
The return loop goes down the other side of the valley, and is a wooden boardwalk type walkway through marshland and some grazing fields. As we were walking along here, there was a few Dragonflies that kept landing on the railings of the walkway. There was one bright red one that almost appeared to be following us. They are quite amazing to look at up close although a little scary when they fly at you and land on your head - which happened to me. Although apparently that’s good luck.
As we continued on the trail there were lots of sheep taking refuge from the sun under some trees. As you cross the valley there are some spectacular views back towards the mountains and the upper lake before you meet back up with the original trail we took earlier. As we re-entered the forested area, we encountered yet another deer. It was just munching on the undergrowth until eventually it bounded off.
There’s a Japanese phrase that you may have heard of as it’s become popular lately: Shinrin-Yoku. This literally means forest bathing. It’s the practice of relaxation by surrounding yourself with nature. Well, I’m sure there’s more to it than that, but I was thinking about this a lot during our trip to Glendalough. There’s just something special about walking through the trees surrounded by nature and fresh air. Even when we started and it was still misty with sporadic rain it was so refreshing. There really is something about being among the trees that brings a sense of peace and connection to nature that does wonders for your stress levels.
For those interested in the technical details of these, they were all photographed using a Canon R6 Mark II with 24-105STM lens. Processing was done in Lightroom using a custom modified version of one of my Presets as a base. A few images were enhanced with DXO Pure Raw, but the majority were processed in Lightroom. At the start of the trip it was quite dark, and as the STM lens is quite slow, I ended up shooting at a reasonably high ISO although I tired to keep it around 800 to 1600 as after that it got very noisy. I should have used a Tripod (yes, I know) but there was a lot of tourists and it would have been a pain as they literally walk on top of you. Next time!
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