This week I took the family on a camping trip which started at Knockalla Donegal for 2 nights and finished back at Banone for a further 5 nights. Unfortunately I didnt get the chance to explore Knockalla range so made time for myself to explore Bienvenagh. I am not familiar with this area but do know what roads to take to get me into the hills. So I headed out on Thursday morning about 10.30 and drove off into the hills. I headed up the Tircreven Road and about 100m’s before the Bishops road junction I pulled over beside a gate at the top of the forest.
Tircreven road just below Bishops road Junction
From here I followed the fence line along the top of the forest heading North West. By now the Sun was throwing out alot of heat already but on I went anyway. The fence line and the forest both turned a sharp left heading back down the hill again so I decided to follow anyway. 
Anyway I headed down the hill as I was hoping to find away along the bottom of the cliff to find the standing stone. But after about 15 minutes or so I realised this wasn’t going to be so straight forward and found myself having to head back up again. As I did, I could see some cliff faces poking out from what I can only disgribe as a gully carved out of the side off the cliff face.
My decent into the Gully
Whilst I was standing at the top of the gully taking in the views I happened to notice something move on the grass bank below me which caught me by surprise as I nearly stood on a couple of them
The locals
Inside the gullyThe Goats Trail
The Goats Trail
The Goats Trail took me further round the cliff face but yet again I found myself having to head back up again to the top of the cliffs as could find away through the Brambles and vegetation. So up i went anyway and headed North West again along the fence line at the top of the cliffs for a good half mile before coming to another little brook were I stopped and rested again while taking in more of the view form up there.
On my way back up again
After my short break I decided just to head back across the fields towards the forest and my car again as the heat by now was getting very strong and I was already running low on water and a headache was on it’s way as well.
At this point lunch sprung to mind
I soon found myself standing at the top of the gully I was in before with the little stream running into it from the fields above. I followed the stream on in for a bit and found the source of the Frogs.
The Little'ns
View from top of the gully
So I soon picked up a trail which took me back through the fields and back to my car again. Hopefully next time I go I will actually manage to find my way to the standing stone. if your in the area though you should take time to explore Bienvenagh, it is without question another place of outstanding natural beauty in our humble little land. Hope you enjoyed my first attempt at a blog as much I did, more to follow soon.
Heading back
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