Slievegower and Slieveboy Loop Walk
Slieveboy has 4 different loop walks which are all marked ways. None of the marked ways will take you to the summits however a short there and back leg will get you both Slievegower and Slieveboy summits. We decided to start via the red route, but we walked the route in reverse which would take us near the summit of Slievegower first. From Askamore (amply parking at the trailhead in the village) small back roads are followed and have several sites of heritage along the way.

Once you leave the road the trail is narrow and overgrown somewhat which I would imagine is due to the lack of footfall due to Covid-19. There seems to be many options of tracks and trails to explore throughout the entire walk. However we followed mostly the red and purple routes with some forest tracks too. The summit of Slievegower is a little highlight (should this be on MV as a summit?). We met a friendly local who pointed us in the direction of the access trail to the summit. Watch out for the turn at T 04598 58822. It is worth noting that the trail is interlaced and crosses a Mountain Biking Trail but it appears walkers and horse trekkers travel on the track. The summit views from Slievegower are excellent. It also appears that you can cross this summit from NE to SW. This trail would have to be explored to confirm this, but my hunch would be that walkers coming via the red route could access Slievegower via a trail from the NE and then continue SW back down to the red marked trail.

We later joined the purple route however we didn't follow this in its entirety. There are several forest tracks which you can choose from depending on the length of walk you may wish to do. The purple route loops around Slieveboy to the west and on it's way back don't forget to take in the summit of Slieveboy, albeit a there and back section of the trail, it's still worth popping up to the summit.

Sadly the summit Trig point is cast to the side like a fallen warrior of times gone by. Although the summit views are good, the summit masts do take away from the trip to the summit. Slievegower can be seen NE sticking out from the trees and beckons one to visit ;) From Slieveboy you can see many summits of Wicklow, the Blackstairs and Leinster Mountain. The coast, on a day like today (sunny) looks splendid and inviting. From the summit of Slieveboy back to the car via the purple route will take around 40 mins. For summit baggers a quick up and down via the purple route could be done in 1.5 hours. Overall a good hike with options for shorter or longer routes.