Day 2: Cappawhite to Milestone
Distance: 19.6km
This latter half of the Multeen Way was a very handy walk along roads and trails, taking us in total about five hours including a short detour to the high point of Foildarg along the way.
We parked a car opposite the old post office in Milestone (below) and drove back to Cappawhite where we parked our second car, stopping at Ryan’s Centra for coffee before starting our walk.
Garracummer Wind Farm
After a short uphill section of road, it wasn’t long before we found ourselves in windfarm country, surrounded by lots and lots of giant wind turbines.
Foildarg
We could see on our map that there was a high point (Foildarg) not too far off track and we decided to take a bit of a detour to find it. I’m glad we did as, firstly we got to walk up this fabulous stony path to the top, and, when we reached the ‘summit’, we found this lovely memorial plaque placed at the trig point in tribute to David Alan Addison, a pilot who crash landed at the spot in 1968. If you’re walking the trail from Cappawhite towards Milestone, then you’ll find the turn off to the trig point just before a barrier at coordinates: 52.610094999999724, -8.159763999999972
Red Hills Plane Crash
I located the image below from the Civil Defence website.
The photo of the newspaper clip below can be found on The Order of Malta’s Archives Facebook page, along with other photographs.
The walking along this section of the trail was easy paced, along forest tracks, and with fabulous views of patchwork green fields and rolling hills as far as the eye could see.
Sarsfield’s Ride
We’ve found that walking various routes over the last few weeks has inspired us to research and read about various historical sites (and sights) that we come across. The sign above points the way along the 70 mile long historical Sarsfield’s Ride.
From the Independent newspaper:
Sarsfields Ride, is one of the great exploits in military history and remained vivid in folklore. It was part of the Siege of Limerick during the Jacobite War of 1690 when William’s troops had arrived before the city with a clear expectation of a quick defeat of the Irish. The purpose of the cavalry ride was to intercept a military siege train, on its way from Dublin and due to arrive in Limerick on Monday, 12 August. Information about the train’s location was received at the Irish headquarters at King John’s Castle and prompted Sarsfield to try and intercept it before its arrival in Limerick.
The section above was as difficult as this section of the Multeen Way got – a two kilometre stretch through fields where cattle had been grazing. The grass had grown waist high in one of the fields and we had to be careful to avoid holes where they’d plodded along. But it wasn’t too bad.
It wasn’t too long before we were back on road again and making our way towards Milestone to the car.
Which Way Now?
So, we finished the Multeen Way and, if we were progressing Northwards like O’Sullivan Beara, we would start to walk the Ormond Way. Instead, because the days are getting shorter and daylight is fading earlier, we will start the Ballyhoura Way in the coming weeks and make our way closer to home.
In the meantime, maybe someone reading this will know why the Ormond Way is closed one day a year?