Slieve Donard

About Slieve Donard

Slieve Donard is the highest mountain in Northern Ireland and in Ulster, the highest in the northern half of Ireland, and seventh highest on the island overall. The highest of the Mourne Mountains, it rises near Newcastle on the County Down coast and looks out over the Irish Sea.

The Mourne Wall, built in the early twentieth century, climbs the western and southern slopes and meets a small stone tower at the top. Two ancient burial cairns also survive on the summit, one of them the remains of the highest known passage tomb in Ireland.

In Irish mythology the mountain was linked to Boirche and Slángha, and later to Saint Donard, said to have kept his hermitage on the summit and from whom the name comes. Into the 1830s an annual pilgrimage brought people to the top, possibly descended from a Lughnasadh harvest ritual.

Background written from facts in the Wikipedia article on Slieve Donard (CC BY-SA 4.0). Heights, prominence and grid references come from the Database of British & Irish Hills, not from Wikipedia.

Access rights here

General position for Northern Ireland — local byelaws, seasonal restrictions and closures can override it. Full details: access rights in Northern Ireland · check another location.

Daylight at this summit today

Sunrise

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Sunset

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Daylight

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Civil twilight ends

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Computed astronomically for 54.180, -5.921. Plan your finish with the daylight safety planner.

Long-distance paths past this hill

One waymarked long-distance route runs within 2.5 km of the summit — useful if you are linking this hill into a longer walk, or want a made path for the approach.

Route lines © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL); distance from the summit computed by OpenFell.

The Slieve Donard group

One other listed summit sits in the same prominence group, with Slieve Donard as the independent hill at its head.

Grouping is by prominence alone: a summit belongs to the nearest higher Marilyn it connects to without a deeper intervening col. Over a large massif that can gather hills no one would walk in a single day, and which few would describe as parts of the same mountain — it is a measure of independence, not a suggested route.

Nearest listed peaks