darrenf on Silsean

What could be more Irish for St Patricks day than a ramble in our green hills!! I followed csds advice and approached Silsean from the Garryknock side. There is a forest track indicated on sheet 56 at A (O031 036) and this is where I parked up. There is the standard coillte yellow and black forest gate across this track and while the whole area looks less than frequently used, in the short space of time it took me to pull on my boots and pack the bag no less than two local farmers approached the gate, unlocked it, and entered the forest area to herd and feed sheep. There is really only room for perhaps two cars at this location and due care should be given not to block the gate. In hindsight there are also plenty of parking opportunities further along this road, in particular around the houses at the end of the road.

So off I set along the forest track through the trees. I stuck with this track until it petered out as indicated on sheet 56. As you come to the end of the track there is a large turning circle and from here the track narrows and continues for perhaps another 50m. At this point a fence appears on your right hand side and inside it there is a faint track. While it does look fairly inhospitable just stick with it as it gradually opens up and is easy to walk along (fence should be with you on your right hand side the whole way). In no time at all you will be led onto open mountian and from here its a short forward skip to the summit.

My dated version of sheet 56 indicated forestry to the summit of Silsean which is certainly not the case. The photos of csd and simon3 show a timber post which indicates the summit of Silsean. As you can see from the photo below someone has taken the time to build a somewhat decorative cairn around this timber post - from a distance it looks just like a wishing well! Car to summit could be comfortably completed in 50mins. Refer to Moanbane for rest of route. Linkback: mountainviews.ie/summit/113/comment/4517/

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Ochill is the name for this summit area!

Silsean is not the appropriate name for the SW end of Moanvayn or Moanbane hill. This name never appeared on any Ordnance Survey map till the early 1990s when OSi were seeking feedback from users of their new 1:50,000 Discovery maps. There seems to have been a knowledge that Liam Price identified this as a local name and listed it as 'Shileshawn' in his Placenames of County Wicklow (1950s), where he clearly says it applies to the NORTHERN side of the hill and the Ballynastockan Brook area in particular. I verified this with local people again in recent years who know this name for the area often called the Shiney Flags on the northern flanks of the hill. The hill as a whole is known locally as Moanvayn and the SW end is called Ochill or Oghill, said like Oakhill. However hillwalkers seem to have considered that the NE summit is Moanbane as per OS and therefore erroneously concluded that by default, that Silsean should the other more SW summit, then fed this information to OSi, who are promulgating it on their maps. I have been contacted many times by people telling me that EastWest Mapping maps are wrong, because Silsean is marked differently on OSi maps - so please take note. Silsean is not the correct local name for this top and the fact that it appears on an OSi publication does not make it gospel!! :) Please excuse my frustration as it arises often! Linkback: mountainviews.ie/summit/113/comment/18612/

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csd on Silsean

There were still patches of snow on Mullaghcleevaun from the storms earlier this week. This picture shows the view over to Mullaghcleevaun from the small pond northeast of the summit of Silsean. Linkback: mountainviews.ie/summit/113/comment/726/

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Cairn and other repairs.

Just a quick note reference Darrenf's mention of the new Cairn on top of Silsean.
Myself and some friends who live in Ballyknockan often walk in the general area of Silsean, Moanbane and Mullacleevaun. We were getting frustrated with the state of the summit of Silsean which had almost totally turned to a wet boggy mess because of the motorbikes and quad bikes which on an almost weekly basis would joyride all over this area.
We started to build the Cairn using stone from about 100 to 150 metres away in a northerly direction. We carried a lot of the stone by hand but also used a stretcher.
As well as building the cairn we also moved a lot of sods from lower on the hill to the summit in order to get some of the grass and other plants to take root and hopefully displace some of the water and make the ground "walkable" again.
We hope to finish the cairn his summer. We intend on making a beehive shape so it should be at least a meter higher and should be seen from further away.
Thankfully it seems that the biking has stopped since the signs went up for National Park at the forest gates above Ballyknockan.
If anyone has the energy or inclination they could always bring a small stone up the hill on their next walk! Linkback: mountainviews.ie/summit/113/comment/4592/

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simon3 on Silsean

This is the sad summit of Silsean as it is in March 2008. Compare this picture to that of csd's just four and a half years ago. The bikers have churned up the soil destroying the vegetation over the area beside the post you can see in both picures.

The group in the background are in front of Mullaghcleevaun. Linkback: mountainviews.ie/summit/113/comment/2988/

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